Matthew 5:10-12

¹⁰ “Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness’ sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. ¹¹ “Blessed are you when others revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account. ¹² Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is great in heaven, for so they persecuted the prophets who were before you.

I’d like you to meet Youcef Nadarkhani.  Youcef lives in Iran and is a Christian pastor.  He was arrested in December of 2006 for sharing the gospel with Muslims.  He was later released.  In 2009, he protested a policy saying that all children should be taught Islam in Iranian schools since the Iranian constitution technically allows for a measure of religious freedom.  He was arrested again, this time for protesting.  In June of 2010, his wife was arrested on the charge of apostasy, primarily, it is believed, in an effort to get Youcef to renounce Christianity.  She was held for four months in an Iranian prison.  Youcef was kept in prison and his charges were changed from protesting to apostasy and evangelism.

In September of 2010, Youcef was given the death sentence for apostasy.  He was put in a prison where he was not allowed to see his family or friends.  While in prison, he was given a number of chances to convert back to Islam.  He refused to do so every time.  In November of 2010, he was condemned to be hanged.  He was informed that should he recant Christianity and return to Islam, the sentence would be annulled.  He resolutely refused to abandon Jesus.

The case of Youcef Nadarkhani caught worldwide attention.  After great international pressure was brought to bear, Youcef was finally set free in September of last year.  He was re-arrested in December and set free again in January of this year.

Youcef was released due to international outrage at the injustice of his sentence.  Most persecuted Christians, however, are not so fortunate.  For most who are suffering today for their faith, there is very little international outrage at all.  In fact, there’s very little knowledge of such persecution in the first place.

For instance, probably none of us lost sleep last night over Mohommad, a young Iranian man who was delivered from drug addiction after he accepted Christ and become a Christian.  He says that he witnesses to everybody he meets and that he has led over 1,000 people have prayed to received Christ.  He was at the beach one day sharing the gospel when the police arrested him.  This is what he said:

“When they arrested me…I just knew that God was sending me to a place to witness…So I didn’t fight [or argue] so they would take me to the jail…They took me to jail, and I saw two people who were bound because their crimes were very serious.  When I came to those people I told them, ‘God has sent me to save you.’  By faith I believe that those who are around me God has sent for me to share the gospel.  So I shared the gospel very briefly, just about 15 minutes, and they…received Christ…I only had those 15 minutes to share the gospel because immediately after I shared the gospel the police came and said, ‘You have been very good and you shouldn’t be here.  You were very kind to us, and we want to release you…They opened the door and said I could go.  When they opened the door to release me, I hugged those two criminals and they were crying and hugging me really hard.  So the warden of the police was like, ‘You have only known these people for 15 minutes and they act like you are family.’”[1]

Persecuted, but to a glorious end.  However, not all who are persecuted are able to avoid pain and death like Mohommad did.  Mohommad has paid a price for his witness.  It is extremely likely that he will do so again.

Probably none of us lost sleep last night over Karim Siaghi, an Algerian Christian.  Karim went to a phone shop to buy minutes for his cell phone.  When he and the shop owner started talking about religion, Karim refused to cite the Muslim creed, “There is no God but Allah and Muhammad is his Prophet,” saying instead that he was a Christian.  The shop owner called the authorities, accused Karim of insulting Muhammed, and had him arrested.  Karim was recently sentenced to five years in prison and fined 200,000 Algerian Dinars even though his accuser brought no witnesses or evidence for the accusation.

Probably none of us lost sleep last night for Coptic Christian women and girls in Cairo, who are now being harassed in the women-only cars of the transit system by some Muslim women wearing the niqab covering.  The absence of the niqab covering for the Christian women makes them easily visible as non-Muslims.  Recently, two girls, aged 13 and 16, were assaulted and had their hair cut off by an angry mob.  A 30-year-old Christian woman broke her arm after a mob of women pushed her off the train onto a platform.

Probably none of us lost sleep last night over Pastor Samuel Kim of Jerusalem Prayer House in Kannur village of India.  Pastor Kim was hospitalized after being beaten unconscious on a road at night by Hindu extremists from the Bharatiya Janata Party.  While recovering from the beating, the extremists slipped into the hospital and tried, unsuccessfully, to slit the pastor’s throat to finish the job.

Probably none of us lost sleep last night over Mursal Isse Sia, aged 55, who was shot to death outside of his home in Beledweyne after receiving numerous death threats because he converted to Christianity.

Probably none of us lost sleep last night over the Christians of Chikkamatti, India, who were beaten recently by a mob of Hindu extremists because they were going to baptize forty new believers in Christ.

Probably none of us lost sleep last night over the persecuted Christians of Zanzibar.  After six extremists from the group Uamsho (“Awakening”) were arrested for shooting Fr. Ambrose Mkenda in the face, the group distributed leaflets around Zanzibar that read, “We now want the heads of all the church pastors in Zanzibar.”

And probably none of us lost sleep last night over the Christians of Sudan.  Touchstone magazine recently reported that the Christians in the Nuba Mountains of Sudan feel all alone and forgotten.  After Christian villages in the Sudanese state of South Kordofan were bombed last December, the Nuba Christians expressed surprise at the international silence.  One pastor who insisted on anonymity said, “We are surprised [that] the international community is so silent about the killing in South Kordofan.”[2]

No, most of us probably have not lost any sleep over these terrible situations, not, I think, because we do not care, but because we do not realize how much of this happening in the world today.  Regardless, one thing is for certain:  the Lord God knows and cares about His suffering people.  Interestingly, Jesus concludes the Beatitudes with a statement about persecution.

¹⁰ “Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness’ sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. ¹¹ “Blessed are you when others revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account. ¹² Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is great in heaven, for so they persecuted the prophets who were before you.

Persecution is a reality that Jesus, of course, recognized.  Most importantly, persecution is a reality that the Lord Jesus experienced.  He knows it from the inside.  Jesus knows and cares about His suffering people.  We would do well, then, to play close attention to what he says concerning this unfortunate but inevitable fact.

I. The Inevitable Clash of the Kingdoms: Jesus’ Assumption of Persecution

To begin, let us note that Jesus simply assumes the coming of persecution.  You will recall that we have been looking at the Beatitudes as progressive.  Each Beatitude grows naturally from the Beatitude that precedes it.  Thus, the Christian life begins with poverty of spirit, advancing through morning over our spiritual poverty, then meekness, etc.  The final Beatitude is persecution.  If nothing else, the natural progression we find in the Beatitudes leads us to the conclusion that those who live this kind of life will find persecution at some point along the journey.

The reason for this is that embracing and living the Kingdom-of-God-kind-of-life in the midst of the kingdom of the world inevitably brings conflict.  Perhaps you remember this image that I used to set the context for our journey through the Beatitudes in the initial sermon in this series.

You will remember that we said that the Kingdom of God is “already” but “not yet,” to use George Eldon Ladd’s definition.  That means that the Kingdom of God is not a purely futuristic reality.  It is future, but it is also present.  How is it present?  It is present in the current reign of Jesus among His people.  It is present as the people of God live out the Kingdom of God in the world today.

Thus, the Kingdom of God is breaking into the world wherever and whenever the gospel is preached and the life of the Kingdom of God is lived by disciples of Jesus.  For our purposes this morning, I simply want to point out that the breaking of the Kingdom of God into the world is not a breaking in that is welcome by the world.  It is a point, on the contrary, of great and profound tension.  It is seen, in fact, as an intrusion by the world.

This tension is precisely what led to the crucifixion of Jesus.  The kingdom of the world hates the Kingdom of God.  Darkness hates light.  Thus, the entry of the Kingdom of God into the kingdom of the world through Christ’s reign among His people that is manifested in the transformed lives of disciples is most unwelcome by the world.

It is not welcome.

It is not liked.

It is not wanted.

It is deeply and profoundly resented.

“Persecution,” John Stott said, “is simply the clash between two irreconcilable value systems.”[3]

What this means is the more you live the life of the Kingdom of God within the kingdom of this world, the more the world will hate and despise that life.  In particular, Satan, the devil, hates this intrusion.  Thus, in 2 Corinthians 4:3-4, Paul writes this:

³ And even if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled to those who are perishing. ⁴ In their case the god of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelievers, to keep them from seeing the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God.

Not only does the devil blind the minds of unbelievers, he stirs them to try to destroy this Kingdom-of-God-presence by destroying the followers of Jesus through whom the Kingdom of God is being demonstrated.  The crucial thing to understand is that this clash of kingdoms inevitably brings about persecution.  Now, this is not to say that every person is persecuted in the exact same way or to the exact same extent.  We live in a country that, thankfully, affords us great freedoms and great protections.  Nonetheless, to whatever extent it comes, and in whatever form it comes, following Jesus invites persecution.

Jesus says:

¹⁰ “Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness’ sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. ¹¹ “Blessed are you when others revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account. ¹² Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is great in heaven, for so they persecuted the prophets who were before you.

“When others revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account.”

When.  It is inevitable that it will happen.  It is noteworthy that this is the only Beatitude of the eight that Jesus repeats.  He needs us to understand this:  persecution is inevitable.

In John 15 Jesus put it in terms so blunt that it leaves no room for confusion:

¹⁸ “If the world hates you, know that it has hated me before it hated you. ¹⁹ If you were of the world, the world would love you as its own; but because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, therefore the world hates you. ²⁰ Remember the word that I said to you: ‘A servant is not greater than his master.’ If they persecuted me, they will also persecute you. If they kept my word, they will also keep yours. ²¹ But all these things they will do to you on account of my name, because they do not know him who sent me.

Paul did the same in 2 Timothy 3:12 when he wrote, “Indeed, all who desire to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted”

Let us come to terms, then, with this fact:  the clash between the Kingdom of God and the kingdom of the world will result in the world striking out against God’s people.  It is inevitable.  If you really try to follow Jesus, at some point, in some way, you will pay a price.

Itinerant speaker Richard Owen Roberts tells a story about an encounter he had with a person who did not believe this fact.  Once, after preaching on the inevitability of persecution, a gentleman came up to him and said, “You were wrong on that point. It’s not true that everyone who lives a godly life will suffer persecution. I’m the city attorney, and nobody persecutes the city attorney.

“Allow me to offer you a syllogism,” Mr. Roberts replied.

“Major premise: All who want to live a godly life in Christ Jesus shall suffer persecution.

Minor premise: The city attorney suffers no persecution.

Conclusion: The city lawyer does not want to live a godly life in Christ Jesus.”

II. The Nature of this Inevitable Persecution

What is the nature of this inevitable persecution?  The New Testament speaks in numerous ways about it, so let us take a moment to consider these texts and the descriptions of persecution that they offer.

Let us begin with our passage in Matthew 5.

¹⁰ “Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness’ sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. ¹¹ “Blessed are you when others revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account. ¹² Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is great in heaven, for so they persecuted the prophets who were before you.

Notice that Jesus begins by speaking of verbal persecution:  “Blessed are you when others revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account.”  Being insulted is not a persecution unto death, though it can often lead to greater forms of persecution.  Regardless, this verbal persecution is a reality for which followers of Jesus should be prepared.

Consider how the media speaks about Christians.  Consider the inflammatory language, the insults, the slander, the whole barrage of Christian bashing.  I am not encouraging us to become whiney about these things.  On the contrary, Jesus tells us to rejoice when it happens.  But do note that Jesus foretells the verbal accosting of His people by the world.

Jesus also spoke of persecution in Matthew 10:

¹⁶ “Behold, I am sending you out as sheep in the midst of wolves, so be wise as serpents and innocent as doves. ¹⁷ Beware of men, for they will deliver you over to courts and flog you in their synagogues, ¹⁸ and you will be dragged before governors and kings for my sake, to bear witness before them and the Gentiles. ¹⁹ When they deliver you over, do not be anxious how you are to speak or what you are to say, for what you are to say will be given to you in that hour. ²⁰ For it is not you who speak, but the Spirit of your Father speaking through you. ²¹ Brother will deliver brother over to death, and the father his child, and children will rise against parents and have them put to death, ²² and you will be hated by all for my name’s sake. But the one who endures to the end will be saved. ²³ When they persecute you in one town, flee to the next, for truly, I say to you, you will not have gone through all the towns of Israel before the Son of Man comes.

In these words, we see persecution progressing past verbal to physical.  It moves from bad to worse.  Jesus told His initial followers that they would be drug before courts and flogged.  Even more chilling, family members would turn family members over to be killed for their faith in Christ:  “Brother will deliver brother over to death, and the father his child, and children will rise against parents and have them put to death, and you will be hated by all…”

This idea of the persecution of hatred is repeated by Jesus in John 15:

¹⁸ “If the world hates you, know that it has hated me before it hated you. ¹⁹ If you were of the world, the world would love you as its own; but because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, therefore the world hates you.

Jesus says that we will be hated in the same way that He was hated.  And, I might add, we will be hated for the same reason:  because we are living the life of the Kingdom in the midst of a fallen world that does not want to hear it.

Paul knew the pains of persecution well.  In 1 Corinthians 4, Paul writes:

⁹ For I think that God has exhibited us apostles as last of all, like men sentenced to death, because we have become a spectacle to the world, to angels, and to men. ¹⁰ We are fools for Christ’s sake, but you are wise in Christ. We are weak, but you are strong. You are held in honor, but we in disrepute. ¹¹ To the present hour we hunger and thirst, we are poorly dressed and buffeted and homeless, ¹² and we labor, working with our own hands. When reviled, we bless; when persecuted, we endure; ¹³ when slandered, we entreat. We have become, and are still, like the scum of the world, the refuse of all things.

Paul and his companions underwent hunger, thirst, the wearing of rags, beatings, homelessness, revilings, and slander.  “We have become,” he says, “the scum of the world.”  This is a daunting list indeed!  But see how Paul lived out Jesus’ teachings in the Sermon on the Mount: “When reviled, we bless; when persecuted, we endure; when slandered we entreat.”  He does not begrudge the stripes he is honored to wear for Jesus…but he does have stripes to wear.

In 2 Corinthians 4, he wrote:

⁷ But we have this treasure in jars of clay, to show that the surpassing power belongs to God and not to us. ⁸ We are afflicted in every way, but not crushed; perplexed, but not driven to despair; ⁹ persecuted, but not forsaken; struck down, but not destroyed; ¹⁰ always carrying in the body the death of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may also be manifested in our bodies. ¹¹ For we who live are always being given over to death for Jesus’ sake, so that the life of Jesus also may be manifested in our mortal flesh.

“Afflicted.”  “Perplexed.”  “Persecuted.”  “Struck down.”  These are the verbs that Paul employed to describe his life and ministry, but he does not do so with a defeatist mentality.  He was honored to suffer for Jesus…but suffer he did.

If you would allow it, I would like to add another form of persecution to this list from scripture.  I believe it is a form of persecution that believers are most susceptible to in our country today: wealth, comfort, ease, and nominal Christianity.  This may sound odd, but I would like for you to consider this possibility:  persecution not only comes dressed in hard deprivation, it comes dressed as well in excessive plenty.

Could it be that the devil persecutes some by taking what they have and persecutes others by giving them more than they need?  Or perhaps he persecutes us by stirring our hearts to lust and greed over the good gifts God has given us?  Regardless, there are two ways to destroy a people:  crush them by causing them to despair or crush them by making them so wealthy they never have reason to despair.

And consider, too, the scourge of nominal Christianity.  By nominal Christianity I mean Christianity that is Christianity in name only.  I mean a deceptive Christianity that has the trappings of the faith but not the content.  I mean the name of Jesus but not the actual presence of Jesus.  I would like to propose that one of the ways we are being persecuted today is by the proliferation of groups that call themselves churches but do not have the gospel.  I am referring to churches across all denominational lines who give people a false assurance based on a false gospel that does conform to the truth of the gospel of Jesus Christ.  In truth, one of the most pernicious persecutions we face is the confusion and spiritual carnage that results when people who are still lost in their sins and trespasses are deceived by a form of godliness without true power.

There are many kinds of persecutions.  If we open our eyes to see the various ways that the people of God are harassed, we will see them all around us.  It may seem a daunting task, then, to follow Jesus.  However, in reality, those who suffer for Jesus tend to bear amazing fruit in winning the lost to Christ and in encouraging the church to follow more boldly.  Tertullian famously said, “The blood of the martyrs is the seed of the church.”  Paul Powell put it like this:  “The church is like a nail.  The harder you hit it, the deeper you drive it into the hearts of men and the soul of society.”[4]

III. The Persecuted Rewarded: Here and Hereafter

What is perhaps most significant about this Beatitude isn’t its expectation of persecution, but rather its teaching that we must rejoice in the face of such.

¹⁰ “Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness’ sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. ¹¹ “Blessed are you when others revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account. ¹² Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is great in heaven, for so they persecuted the prophets who were before you.

You are blessed if you are persecuted.  Why?  Because for one who truly loves Jesus like that, the kingdom of Heaven is theirs.  Those who are reviled and slandered should rejoice.  Why?  Because the reward you receive will outweigh the persecution you endure.  Furthermore, as Jesus says, you are in good company, “for so they persecuted the prophets who were before you.”

There is great reward in suffering for Jesus.  We must not think of this in an Islamic sense, as if martyrdom itself transports us straight to Heaven.  You will not enter Heaven through your suffering.  You will enter it only through Christ’s suffering.  No, when Christ speaks of the martyr’s reward, he is not speaking of the means of salvation but rather of the great honor of such an obedience for the saved.  It is an honor to suffer for Jesus.  It is an honor to die for Jesus.  The persecutor can take a life, but he cannot take from the life of the believer the Jesus who resides within him.

An Iranian man named Kambiz was recently interviewed by the [International] Campaign [for Human Rights in Iran] about a raid on his home by Intelligence agents.  His testimony is telling.

Between seven and eight in the morning, three undercover men from Intelligence, who to the best of my knowledge were unarmed, raided my home. . . . I asked them, “Why are you here?” He showed me the warrant—with the judge’s signature—that said they were allowed to enter my home. He told me, “We have this warrant to enter your home and take anything that is related to Christianity.” And as they confiscated all of my crosses, pictures, books, and CDs, throwing everything into a crate, I was right there standing over them. I told them, jokingly, “You forgot one cross.” Mr. Mousavi [an Intelligence officer] asked, “Where is it?” I answered, “In my heart,” and he replied, “I’ll rip your heart out, right out of your chest!”[5]

The persecutor may rip out a believer’s heart.  The persecutor cannot, however, rip Christ from the believer’s heart.  There is no shame in suffering for Jesus.  The reward for doing so is great indeed.  In truth, the only shame is in not being willing to suffer for the Jesus who suffered so very much for us.

Dr. Turner, the pastor of the American Church in Berlin before World War II, once visited Pastor Heinrich Niemoeller.  Henrich Niemoeller and his wife, Paula, were the parents of Martin Niemoeller, a Christian who was at that time suffering in a concentration camp for his opposition to Hitler and the Nazis.  In fact, Niemoeller would spend seven years in Nazi concentration camps, from 1938 to 1945.  Dr. Turner spoke with the Niemoellers about their amazing son and the suffering he was enduring for standing by his Christian convictions and opposing evil.  When they had finished visiting, Dr. Turner stood to go.  Niemoeller’s mother took him by the hand and his father said to him something he would never forget.  This is what he said:

When you go back to America, do not let anybody pity the father and mother of Martin Niemoeller.  Only pity any follower of Christ who does not know the joy that is set before those who endure the cross despising the shame.  Yes, it is a terrible thing to have a son in a concentration camp.  Paul here and I know that.  But there would be something more terrible for us:  if God had needed a faithful martyr, and our Martyn had been unwilling.[6]

Are you willing to be persecuted if the Lord asks it of you?  Are you living a life that is enough of a threat to the devil that he would want to destroy it?

May God find His church faithful, even to the point of death.

“Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness’ sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.”

Exodus 3:1-12

¹ 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. ² 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. ³ And Moses said, “I will turn aside to see this great sight, why the bush is not burned.” ⁴ 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.” ⁵ Then he said, “Do not come near; take your sandals off your feet, for the place on which you are standing is holy ground.” ⁶ 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. ⁷ Then the Lord said, “I have surely seen the affliction of my people who are in Egypt and have heard their cry because of their taskmasters. I know their sufferings, ⁸ 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. ⁹ And now, behold, the cry of the people of Israel has come to me, and I have also seen the oppression with which the Egyptians oppress them. ¹⁰ Come, I will send you to Pharaoh that you may bring my people, the children of Israel, out of Egypt.” ¹¹ But Moses said to God, “Who am I that I should go to Pharaoh and bring the children of Israel out of Egypt?” ¹² 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.”

God seems to work most in the contrasts of life.  For instance, when we are weak, He gives us strength out of the storehouse of His omnipotence.  When we are broken, He gives us healing from the great provisions of His own hospital of grace.  When we are helpless, He draws us near to His more-than-sufficient love.  This is evident in the Bible as well as in our daily lives.  God indeed seems to work in the contrasts.

This is perhaps nowhere clearer than in the story of the Exodus, in general.  In the Exodus, God’s power meets Israel’s powerlessness with staggering and wonderful results:  God saves His people.  So, too, we find intriguing contrasts in the events leading up to the Exodus, as in, for instance, the call of Moses.

I. The Holiness and the Lowliness of Moses (v.1-6)

The first contrast that strikes us is between God’s holiness and Moses’ lowliness.  This becomes evident in the way that God calls Moses to his task.  When we find Moses in the beginning of this chapter, he has had to flee Egypt after killing the Egyptian who was assaulting the Hebrew.  Moses flees to Midian where he rescues the seven daughters of Jethro from marauding shepherds.  Jethro then gives Moses one of his daughters in marriage and she bears a son.  Moses then takes up with the family and is helping his father-in-law with his flock when something most interesting and unusual happens.

¹ 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. ² 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.

You have perhaps read naturalistic explanations of the burning bush.  Those who want to downplay the miraculous nature of this appearance will say that there is a bush in the Middle East that, when the sun hits it just so, looks as if it is burning.  I hope I will be forgiven if I don’t spend any time on such an idea.  This is clearly a miraculous visitation by God through the medium of a bush that is burning and not consumed.

Moses’ response is telling.

³ And Moses said, “I will turn aside to see this great sight, why the bush is not burned.” ⁴ 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.”

What is interesting about this is the implied suggestion that Moses might not have turned aside to see what this strange sight was.  He could have dismissed it as an irrelevant oddity.  He could have said he was too busy.  Tending a flock, after all, certainly requires the full attention of the shepherd, especially in such a rocky region.  But Moses turns aside to see what this unusual sight is.

It is not insignificant that God speaks to Moses only after God sees that Moses has turned aside:  “When the Lord saw that he turned aside to see, God called to him…”  It is significant because it suggests that God’s call was contingent upon Moses’ turning.  Meaning, had Moses not turned, God would not have called him, at least not at that time in that way.  Moses would have missed a divine encounter if Moses had been to busy or too disinterested or too distracted to turn and see.

Just think of that:  had Moses been too busy, Moses would have missed God.

It raises an awkward and unavoidable question for us:  how often do we miss God’s call because we are too busy or too distracted?  How often has God desired to show us some marvelous thing, tell us some life-changing thing, or call us to some world-changing task but we missed it because we were too busy to stop and see.  And how often have we missed even startling clues, our own burning bushes, we might say, that God gives us, calling us to step out of our preset paths to encounter the divine?

In Hebrews 13:2, the writer says, “Do not neglect to show hospitality to strangers, for thereby some have entertained angels unawares.”  That verse has always intrigued me.  It is an amazing thought:  sometimes we’re in the very presence of angels and don’t realize it.  And why don’t we realize it?  Because we’re too busy to turn our attention to divine things.  Or perhaps we’re too stuck in our routines even to entertain the thought that divine things might break into our world.

Moses was not too busy.  We may thank God for that!  He turned aside and God spoke to him.  What God said was fascinating.

⁵ Then he said, “Do not come near; take your sandals off your feet, for the place on which you are standing is holy ground.” ⁶ 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.

Note that the very first thing God says to Moses is an acknowledgment of the distance between them.  God declares His holiness and Moses lowliness.  He declares His holiness by (a) telling Moses to keep his distance, (b) telling Moses to take off his shoes, (c) declaring the ground on which Moses was standing “holy ground,” and (d) voicing his name over Moses.

Why does God not simply commission Moses out of the gate?  Why this preface of holiness and power?  The people of God are suffering.  There is work to be done.  There should be a sense of urgency here.  Why this highlighting of the contrast between God and Moses?

It is almost certainly because the success of Moses’ endeavor would depend entirely on Moses’ awareness of the truth about God.  Only a great and mighty and powerful and holy God would be worth the trials through which Moses was about to journey.  Only a transcendent God of awesome strength could be a sufficient enough reason for the staggering courage that Moses would be called to display.

Conversely, it was crucial that Moses understand his own lowliness.  It was crucial that Moses understand that he was the instrument in the hand of an awesome God.  He was the instrument.  He was not God.  He was the tool of deliverance.  He was not the One wielding the tool of deliverance.  It was vital that Moses not trust in his own strength, his own wisdom, his own power.  God establishes the contrast because it is only in light of the contrast that we can have a right relationship with God.

Jesus does the same thing in the gospels.  Jesus’ first message was, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand” (Matthew 4:17).  That, too, is the voicing of the contrast. God is holy.  We are not.  We must take our shoes off.  We must repent.  We must, like Moses, fall on our faces before God.  “And Moses hid his face, for he was afraid to look at God.”

Without the contrast, we do not come to God in humility.  Without the contrast, we dare to think that we are sufficient in our own strength.  Without the contrast, we are yet lost.

Do you realize that this God we worship is mighty, powerful, strong, eternal, everlasting, holy, pure, and true?  Do you realize that He is God and we are not?

II. The Strength of God and the Helplessness of His People (v.7-9)

There is an individual contrast in this calling, the contrast between God and Moses.  There is also a corporate contrast between God and Israel as a people.

⁷ Then the Lord said, “I have surely seen the affliction of my people who are in Egypt and have heard their cry because of their taskmasters. I know their sufferings, ⁸ 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. ⁹ And now, behold, the cry of the people of Israel has come to me, and I have also seen the oppression with which the Egyptians oppress them.

God voices the distinction between Himself and His people with powerful and encouraging bluntness.  The people are suffering, but God will give victory.  The people are in pain, but God will give healing.  The people are oppressed, but God will set them free.  The people have no hope, but God will give them a reason to rejoice.  The people have no home, but God will give “a good and broad land.”

It is as day and night, God and His suffering people.  There is no hint of worry in the voice of this great God.  He does not say, “I think I can do it.  I think I can deliver them.  I think I can set them free.”

No.  Here is simply the raw declaration of what will be from the mouth of one who knows what He speaks:  “I have come down to deliver them out of the hand of the Egyptians.”  In Psalm 2, the psalmist captured well the certain might of our holy God.

¹ Why do the nations rage
and the peoples plot in vain?

² The kings of the earth set themselves,
and the rulers take counsel together,
against the Lord and against his Anointed, saying,

³ “Let us burst their bonds apart
and cast away their cords from us.”

⁴ He who sits in the heavens laughs;
the Lord holds them in derision.

⁵ Then he will speak to them in his wrath, and terrify them in his fury, saying,

⁶ “As for me, I have set my King
on Zion, my holy hill.”

⁷ I will tell of the decree:
The Lord said to me, “You are my Son;
today I have begotten you.

⁸ Ask of me, and I will make the nations your heritage, and the ends of the earth your possession.

⁹ You shall break them with a rod of iron
and dash them in pieces like a potter’s vessel.”

¹⁰ Now therefore, O kings, be wise; be warned, O rulers of the earth.

¹¹ Serve the Lord with fear,
and rejoice with trembling.

¹² Kiss the Son,
lest he be angry, and you perish in the way,
for his wrath is quickly kindled.
Blessed are all who take refuge in him.

Only a King above all kings can laugh at all kings.  Only a God above all gods can laugh at all gods.  The one true God is strong.  He is powerful.  He speaks out of the confidence of His own self-understanding.

In our limited understanding, we might question God’s timing.  In our limited understanding, we might question God’s means and methods.  However, we should never question God’s ability.  Our God is able.

There is comfort in this for those suffering today.  There is comfort in this for you.  In this world, we will experience fear and helplessness.  The gift of God to His people is, first, His ability to overcome any obstacle you are facing, any trial you are enduring, any suffering under which you currently struggle.

God sees you.  God remembers you.  God knows you.  God is able to act to deliver you.  Our God is able!

III. The Certainty of God and the Terror of Moses (v.10-12)

The third contrast is closely connected to the second.  It is the contrast between the certainty of God and the terror of Moses.  We have seen that God is confident in God’s own ability to do what only God can do.  Moses, however, while recognizing the holiness of God, shudders at the call God places on his life.

¹⁰ Come, I will send you to Pharaoh that you may bring my people, the children of Israel, out of Egypt.” ¹¹ But Moses said to God, “Who am I that I should go to Pharaoh and bring the children of Israel out of Egypt?”

Who am I?  It is a valid question!  It is as if Moses sees the contrast between himself and God but does not realize that God will reach across the divide to lead, empower, and embolden him.  It is right to realize that you are not God.  That is a crucial piece of self-understanding that too many people do not reach.  But it is wrong, on that basis, to assume that God cannot use you.  On the contrary, it is only when you realize your weakness and insufficiency that God is ready to use you.  This is because, in the end, it is not you who is working, but God in you.  The Lord’s answer reveals this all-important fact.

¹² 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.”

God sends Moses.  God is with Moses.  These two facts are necessary to understand.  Outside of them, Moses’ terror and fright are utterly justified.  Outside of the indwelling presence of the all-powerful God, Moses is right to shudder and dread this commission.  But when God sends you and promises you His presence, the time for trembling is over.

Any call that is not a call from God is a call that is doomed to fail.  J. Stephen Muse wrote, “There is a saying among monks that ‘if you go into the desert without being called by God, you will go mad.’”[1]  Indeed you will!

Without God’s presence, Moses would have gone mad.  He seems on the brink of it at merely the initial suggestion.  But God comforts Moses.  God will be with the one He calls.  It is a crucial bit of understanding:  God will be with the one He calls.

Has He called you to some task?  Is He asking you to set your hand to some plow?  It he calling you to something that you know only He can accomplish?

If so, tremble not.  Fret not.  Fear not.  When God calls, God equips, and what He equips us with more than anything is His own presence.

These contrasts between ourselves and God are important.  They must be acknowledged lest we lapse into arrogance.  But remember that God is the God who works in the contrasts.  He knows the gulf between us and Him, and, in Christ, has reached across that gulf to empower us for ministry and for life.

Exodus 2:11-25

¹¹ One day, when Moses had grown up, he went out to his people and looked on their burdens, and he saw an Egyptian beating a Hebrew, one of his people. ¹² He looked this way and that, and seeing no one, he struck down the Egyptian and hid him in the sand. ¹³ When he went out the next day, behold, two Hebrews were struggling together. And he said to the man in the wrong, “Why do you strike your companion?” ¹⁴ He answered, “Who made you a prince and a judge over us? Do you mean to kill me as you killed the Egyptian?” Then Moses was afraid, and thought, “Surely the thing is known.” ¹⁵ When Pharaoh heard of it, he sought to kill Moses. But Moses fled from Pharaoh and stayed in the land of Midian. And he sat down by a well. ¹⁶ Now the priest of Midian had seven daughters, and they came and drew water and filled the troughs to water their father’s flock. ¹⁷ The shepherds came and drove them away, but Moses stood up and saved them, and watered their flock. ¹⁸ When they came home to their father Reuel, he said, “How is it that you have come home so soon today?” ¹⁹ They said, “An Egyptian delivered us out of the hand of the shepherds and even drew water for us and watered the flock.” ²⁰ He said to his daughters, “Then where is he? Why have you left the man? Call him, that he may eat bread.” ²¹ And Moses was content to dwell with the man, and he gave Moses his daughter Zipporah. ²² She gave birth to a son, and he called his name Gershom, for he said, “I have been a sojourner in a foreign land.” ²³ During those many days the king of Egypt died, and the people of Israel groaned because of their slavery and cried out for help. Their cry for rescue from slavery came up to God. ²⁴ And God heard their groaning, and God remembered his covenant with Abraham, with Isaac, and with Jacob. ²⁵ God saw the people of Israel—and God knew.

I spent Monday through Wednesday of last week in Nashville where I attended a training seminar for pastors on developing disciples in the life of the church.  In preparation for that, we were asked to read a book entitled Transformational Discipleship.  I don’t know that I would have naturally picked up that book, but I actually enjoyed it very much.  It challenged me to think more deeply about the task of forming disciples.

The basic premise of the book is that discipleship is an act of transformation in the life of the believer.  As we walk with Jesus, we are transformed into disciples.  But that process usually involves, the authors say, three realities.  First, the people of God must be in a posture to receive the truths of God leading to transformation.  Second, there must be a leader who is equipped to impart these transforming truths to the rightly-postured people.  Third, there must be the divine truth that transforms.  Where these three truths overlap and converge – truth, receptivity to the truth, and a leader to lead in the truth – they create what the authors of the book call “the transformational sweet spot.”  I know that sounds like jargon, but the point is simple:  we are transformed when we reach a point where we’re ready for transformation, when there is a leader to lead us through the process, and when that leader has life-changing truth from God.

After I read Exodus 2:11-25 and outlined what I saw in this passage, I was struck by the fact that my three points tonight represent those three realities.

• A posture of receptivity on the part of God’s people:  Israel’s suffering and longing for God.
• The presence of a leader to lead through the process of transformation:  Moses.
• Divine, life-transforming truth:  God’s covenant faithfulness.

In these verses, we do not see the full convergence of these three into “the transformational sweet spot,” but we do see these three elements beginning to come together.  The people are suffering and yearning for divine help.  Moses begins to break free from his life as an Egyptian and move toward his call to be a leader.  And God, as always, is mindful of His covenant promises with Israel.  I’ve entitled this “Ascent, Pain, and Remembrance.”  I am referring there to the ascent of Moses to leadership, the pain of God’s people, and God’s covenant faithfulness to Israel.

Let us observe the slow convergence of these three realities.

I. The Rise of Moses (v.11-22)

First, we begin to see the rise of Moses to leadership.  It is a difficult and, seemingly, circuitous rise that involves his own personal flight from Egypt and eventual return to lead Israel out of bondage.  He has, up until verse 11, been living in the palace of Pharaoh.  One day, however, events conspire that lead to his break with his former life.

¹¹ One day, when Moses had grown up, he went out to his people and looked on their burdens, and he saw an Egyptian beating a Hebrew, one of his people. ¹² He looked this way and that, and seeing no one, he struck down the Egyptian and hid him in the sand. ¹³ When he went out the next day, behold, two Hebrews were struggling together. And he said to the man in the wrong, “Why do you strike your companion?” ¹⁴ He answered, “Who made you a prince and a judge over us? Do you mean to kill me as you killed the Egyptian?” Then Moses was afraid, and thought, “Surely the thing is known.” ¹⁵ When Pharaoh heard of it, he sought to kill Moses. But Moses fled from Pharaoh and stayed in the land of Midian. And he sat down by a well.

We could debate, perhaps, the ethics of Moses’ actions.  Was he wrong to kill the Egyptian?[1]  It is an interesting question, but, for our purposes, not the primary question.  The primary question is, what does this act of violence reveal about Moses?  What it reveals is Moses’ initial ascent to leadership.  How so?

First, we see Moses’ initial ascent into leadership in his choice to break free from his life as an Egyptian in favor of embracing his life as a Hebrew.  I mentioned earlier that events conspired that facilitated this break.  In fact, the break with Egypt happened before Moses encountered the brutal Egyptian.  Before this happened, Moses determined to be free of Pharaoh’s house.  How do we know this?  Our text this evening does not say it.  Fortunately, in the great “Hall of Faith” of Hebrews 11, we are given insights into Moses’ spiritual and mental condition.

²⁴ By faith Moses, when he was grown up, refused to be called the son of Pharaoh’s daughter, ²⁵ choosing rather to be mistreated with the people of God than to enjoy the fleeting pleasures of sin. ²⁶ He considered the reproach of Christ greater wealth than the treasures of Egypt, for he was looking to the reward.

The Holy Spirit revealed to the writer of Hebrews that Moses (1) “refused to be called the son of Pharaoh’s daughter” and (2) “cho[se] rather to be mistreated with the people of God than to enjoy the fleeting pleasures of sin.”  Furthermore, while Moses would not have known the name “Jesus” at the time of the events recorded in Exodus 2, Moses nontheless “considered the reproach of Christ greater wealth than the treasures of Egypt, for he was looking to the reward.”

What does this mean?  It means that, behind the events we read of in Exodus 2, there was a spiritual awakening in the life of Moses.  He has set his feet on the path of obedience and leadership.  He does so, of course, roughly and with limited understanding.  He will receive greater understanding soon.  But, for now, there is an agitation in his soul, a sense that a mantle of responsibility has been placed on his shoulders concerning the Israelites.  He acts on the basis of what he can understand, but the significant thing is that Moses acts.

Second, Moses killing the Egyptian reveals an internal concern for justice.  Basil the Great, in commenting on Moses’ behavior, said that Moses possessed “naturally a love for justice.”[2]  Perhaps so, but we also see the hand of God in this, a supernatural grace of concern for the oppressed, we might say.  It is not that Moses did not naturally care, but that, undoubtedly, the Spirit of God pricked His heart at the sight of a Hebrew being unjustly beaten by an Egyptian.

His behavior, then, whether right or wrong, revealed a deep spirit of concern.  It was the concern of a leader.  Regrettably and surprisingly, the Hebrews did not interpret it this way, asking instead, “Who made you a prince and a judge over us” (v.14a)?  John Chrysostom rightly said that the Hebrew asking Moses what right he had to leadership over Israel was similar to somebody asking a man who had just performed successful, skilled surgery on another man’s diseased arm what right he had to be a physician.  Chrysostom imagines the doctor responding, “It is my art, my good sir, and your own ailment.”[3]  Moses had the heart of leadership and Israel had the need.

Third, Moses’ actions showed, more specifically, a concern for the Israelites in particular.  We are assisted here by some comments that Deacon Stephen made in Acts 7 about this situation.  This was the sermon, you might remember, that led to Stephen’s martyrdom.  In it, he said this about Moses:

²³ “When [Moses] was forty years old, it came into his heart to visit his brothers, the children of Israel. ²⁴ And seeing one of them being wronged, he defended the oppressed man and avenged him by striking down the Egyptian. ²⁵ He supposed that his brothers would understand that God was giving them salvation by his hand, but they did not understand. ²⁶ And on the following day he appeared to them as they were quarreling and tried to reconcile them, saying, ‘Men, you are brothers. Why do you wrong each other?’ ²⁷ But the man who was wronging his neighbor thrust him aside, saying, ‘Who made you a ruler and a judge over us? ²⁸ Do you want to kill me as you killed the Egyptian yesterday?’ ²⁹ At this retort Moses fled and became an exile in the land of Midian, where he became the father of two sons.

Significantly, Stephen says that “it came into his heart to visit his brothers, the children of Israel.”  What this means is that Moses was not just casually strolling along when he happened upon the Egyptian beating the Israelite.  However, while he did not necessarily know that he would encounter this exact scene, he certainly knew of the oppression of Israel.  Most importantly, he was driven to visit the Israelites because he saw the Israelites as “his brothers.”

Leadership among God’s people requires a love for God’s people.  Moses visited the Israelites out of a growing love for and sense of solidarity with them.  He killed the Egyptian, rightly or wrongly, out of that same sense of love.  It was not the vague, if sincere, interest of a sympathetic observer.  It was the love of a leader.  It was an awakening.

Moses flees Egypt to Midian.  This is important for a number of reasons, but let me mention two in particular.  For one thing, it prefigures the Exodus itself.  Moses must have his own exodus to be prepared for Israel’s.  He must know the necessity of fleeing Egypt to be prepared to lead Israel to do the same.

Secondly, he shows a continued maturation into leadership in his protection of Jethro’s (he is called Reuel here) daughters.

¹⁶ Now the priest of Midian had seven daughters, and they came and drew water and filled the troughs to water their father’s flock. ¹⁷ The shepherds came and drove them away, but Moses stood up and saved them, and watered their flock.

“Moses stood up and saved them.”  He is entrusted with leadership in great things because he was faithful in smaller things, like saving Jethro’s daughters from the shepherds.  We might also see this reality in the fact that God gives Moses leadership over a family in Midian.

¹⁸ When they came home to their father Reuel, he said, “How is it that you have come home so soon today?” ¹⁹ They said, “An Egyptian delivered us out of the hand of the shepherds and even drew water for us and watered the flock.” ²⁰ He said to his daughters, “Then where is he? Why have you left the man? Call him, that he may eat bread.” ²¹ And Moses was content to dwell with the man, and he gave Moses his daughter Zipporah. ²² She gave birth to a son, and he called his name Gershom, for he said, “I have been a sojourner in a foreign land.”

His decision to leave the house of Pharaoh, his decision to check on the Hebrews, his act of violence against the Egyptian, his attempt to mediate a dispute between two Hebrews, his saving of the daughters of Jethro, his watering of their flock, his marriage, his becoming a father:  these are the stepping stones of Moses’ ascent to great leadership.

II. The Pain of Israel (v.23)

The second element that we see converging toward the collision of these three elements that will culminate in the grand transformation of the people of God that we call “the Exodus” is the tragic element of Israel’s pain.

²³ During those many days the king of Egypt died, and the people of Israel groaned because of their slavery and cried out for help. Their cry for rescue from slavery came up to God.

In his novel, Intruder in the Dust, William Faulkner writes that “the whole chronicle of man’s immortality is in the suffering he has endured, his struggle toward the stars in the stepping-stones of his expiations.”[4]  That is an overstatement (though not as much of one as we would like for it to be), but it is less of one when applied particularly to the Jews who have suffered in immeasurable ways.  Keeping in mind our introductory comments about how suffering affects our spiritual posture in general, making us open to the transforming touch of God, as well as our comments on Exodus 1 two weeks ago about the unintended (on Pharaoh’s part) benefits of his oppression on Israel as far as breaking them free from Egyptian enculturation is concerned, we can only weep with Israel over the immense suffering they have endured.

Pharaoh dies, but this fact is not reported in a hopeful way.  It is not offered to suggest that perhaps a better Pharaoh will take the throne and free the Israelites.  No, the people of God are suffering and, ostensibly, will continue to suffer even more.  They therefore cry out to God for mercy and for help, begging Him to move His saving hand.

He will do precisely that.

III. The Faithfulness of God  (v.24-25)

The third element is the most crucial:  the faithfulness of God.

²⁴ And God heard their groaning, and God remembered his covenant with Abraham, with Isaac, and with Jacob. ²⁵ God saw the people of Israel—and God knew.

We have already discussed God’s covenant faithfulness, but it is at the very heart of this great story, so it will be mentioned frequently.  God makes a covenant promise.  God remembers His covenant promise.  God hears the cries of His people.  God acts.  Here are the components of the faithfulness of God.

It is significant that God “heard their groaning.”  When David had been delivered from the murderous hand of Saul in 2 Samuel 22, he sang this:  “In my distress I called upon the Lord;
to my God I called.
From his temple he heard my voice,
and my cry came to his ears.”

The Lord hears the cries of His people and is faithful to act.  The book of Exodus is simply a chronicle of that fact.  We will see how this works out, but let me end now by applying this truth to us all for our encouragement.

God hears you.

God knows you.

God loves you.

God remembers you.

God will not forget His promises to you.

God will not abandon you.

God has not left you.

Cry to the Lord and know that He hears.

He heard Israel.

He hears you.

He is faithful to deliver.

He is faithful to deliver.