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Advent Productions

Wilderness Wandering

Benjamin Ng

Water From A Rock

We're gonna get into our study for this evening.

We've started a new series from last week.

We are looking at the wilderness wanderings, the journey that the Israelites had when they came out of Egypt and they made their way all the way to Canaan.

And of course, they would go around for 40 years.

But we are looking at the different stories and the encounters that they had along the way.

So we're in our second study this evening.

And the title of that study is Water from a Rock.

So before we get into the study, let's bow our heads for a word of prayer, shall we?

Father in heaven, thank you so much for your watch care again over us.

As we've come to another end of the week, as we look back, just to realize your protection over us, your guidance over us and your leading.

Lord, thank you for bringing us to this point.

And just ask that you'd please be with us now.

Guide us with your Holy Spirit as we open your word to study.

Speak to our hearts, O Lord, we pray in Jesus' name.

So we're going to continue this wilderness wanderings and last week we looked at how they complained about their water, which was bitter, and it was healed, and then their food.

And let's have a look at what happens next.

The Bible says, And all the congregation of the children of Israel journeyed from the wilderness of sin after their journeys, according to the commandment of the Lord, and pitched in Rephidim.

And there was no water for the people to drink.

So now they are in the wilderness of sin and this wilderness of sin has nothing to do with the act of sin itself.

It was just an area in the east of Egypt and so they're still traveling and moving towards Canaan, But they would run into a familiar situation again.

Have they learned their lessons from the last time, from the past, would they turn now to ask God for help?

Wherefore the people did chide with Moses, and said, Give us water that we may drink.

And Moses said unto them, Why chide ye with me?

And the people thirsted there for water, and the people murmured against Moses, and said, Wherefore is this, that thou hast brought us up out of Egypt to kill us and our children and our cattle with thirst?

The word chide here simply means to complain, to contend or debate.

And most likely it's the word complaining that the Bible wants to highlight here as we see the word there in verse 3.

So did they learn their lesson from the last time?

They continued to complain even though it was exact same situation as last time.

They had been provided for miraculously by God, but they weren't grateful.

They did not remember God's provision for them and his goodness.

They seemed to have all these fond memories of Egypt, forgetting that they were actually what?

And moreover, they're accusing Moses of bringing them out to the wilderness to kill them with thirst.

They were being so unreasonable, as if Moses wanted to take all that they had, as if they had a lot of possessions.

Not remembering that Moses once was the prince of Egypt, that he had at his fingertips all the wealth that Egypt had to offer.

And they're complaining and accusing Moses of all these things.

Well, how would Moses react to their complaining?

How would he react to such a statement that they're making here?

Well, Exodus 17 verse 4 tells us, And Moses cried unto the Lord, saying, What shall I do unto this people?

You see, Moses, he was consistent as well.

The Israelites were consistent in the bad way.

Something that the children of Israel themselves should have been doing.

Something that we must learn to do as well today when trouble comes upon us.

You know, friends, too often we allow troubles to separate us from God.

Too often our faith is derailed because of trials that come into our lives or when things just don't go the way that we wish or we planned it.

You know, we have to take a detour or we get there eventually but it took longer than usual, or, you know, different trials and problems that come up.

But, you know, there's an interesting detail here that we see from Moses when he cries to God.

He told God that the children of Israel were almost ready to do what?

And I don't think that was an exaggeration.

I don't think he was stretching the truth.

I really think that that was happening, that they were ready to take stones, to throw at Moses and to kill him.

And you got to remember, the children of Israel, they have been seeing miracle upon miracle upon miracle upon miracle, right?

I mean, before that, they saw the 10 plagues fall down.

They're seeing a pillar of cloud and a pillar of fire.

They're seeing manna rain down every day.

They saw Moses throw in a branch or some sort of leaf and the water was healed that they could drink.

They are seeing miracle upon miracle upon miracle but yet this is not changing them at all.

It's not strengthening their faith in God.

And you see, friends, this is the point that I want to make.

Miracles, they don't strengthen our faith.

And, you know, sometimes we see how God works in miracles and we're reminded of His goodness, we're reminded of His provision and the blessing in our lives.

But unless we allow the freshness of that situation to remain in our mind, to allow His Word to dwell upon our hearts and make us more prayerful, make us more devoted to walk with God.

When these miracles, they take place, but it doesn't drive us to greater devotion and a closer walk with God, it doesn't change us.

We think that more miracles would mean stronger faith, right?

And you'd think that, oh, we go to church and we see all these miracles taking place and we read all these books about miracles in people's lives, but unless we are spending time in God's Word, unless we have faith in Him that is guiding us, Unless these miracles are pushing us to greater faith and greater devotion and a closer walk with Jesus, it will change nothing.

And the next time a trial comes again, we'll start complaining.

God is providing for them, but their faith in God is not growing.

Jethro and Moses

And the title of our study, as you can already see, is Jethro and Moses.

So before we do that, let us bow our heads for a word of prayer.

We thank you so much for you are a great and wonderful God.

Thank you Lord that you have given us your word as a message, as a guiding light in our lives and I pray that this evening as we study your word that you would guide us once more.

Lead us O Lord we pray, in Jesus name we pray and ask.

So the Israelites have just finished fighting the Amalekites and they've obtained a victory.

Moses, remember, he was holding up the rod of God in his hand, Aaron and Hur were assisting him while Joshua and the rest of the Israelites were fighting in the valley below.

But now we come to a pause about the Israelites themselves, and today we're going to be studying about Moses and more of his encounter that he had with Jethro.

So let's turn to our first text found in Exodus 18 verses 1 through 6.

When Jethro the priest of Midian, Moses' father-in-law, heard of all that God had done for Moses and for Israel his people, and that the Lord had brought Israel out of Egypt.

Then Jethro, Moses' father-in-law, took Zipporah, Moses' wife, after he had sent her back, and her 2 sons, of which the name of the 1 was Gershom, for he said, I have been an alien in a strange land, and the name of the other was Eliezer, for the God of my father said he was mine help, and delivered me from the sword of Pharaoh.

And Jethro, Moses' father-in-law, came with his sons and his wife unto Moses into the wilderness, where he encamped at the Mount of God.

And he said unto Moses, I, thy father-in-law Jethro, am come unto thee and thy wife and her 2 sons with her." So after a few weeks, possibly even a few months, of being separated from his family, finally they are reunited again.

They had actually initially started off together as a family to go back to Egypt when Moses was called by God first from the burning bush.

In Exodus 4, verse 18-20, we are told this, to my brethren which are in Egypt, and see whether they yet be alive.' And Jethro said to Moses, Go in peace.

And the Lord said unto Moses and Midian, Go, return into Egypt, for all the men are dead which sought thy life.

And Moses took his wife and his sons and set them upon an ass, and he returned to the land of Egypt, and Moses took the rod of God in his hand.

We don't really read of where Moses left to go back from Jethro.

But he must have thought, pardon me, where his family left to go back to Jethro and they left Moses to go on to Egypt.

But he must have thought it would have been too dangerous for them to be with him there in Egypt.

So he probably sent them back to Midian to wait for him after he had finished his mission.

There was no lack of faith thinking that, you know, God could not protect them.

You know, sometimes that's how we classify it, isn't it?

But we can maybe get to the point where sometimes we're too presumptuous, thinking we have to have the family go.

Maybe Moses' heart might not have been fully set on the task at hand if he were to worry about the safety of his wife and his children as well.

But either way, we've come to the point now where they are now finally reunited again.

In Exodus chapter 18, Verses 7 through 12, we're reading quite a large amount of text here, but it is a story, right?

So they've reunited, but now we read in verse 7 of Exodus 18.

And Moses went out to meet his father-in-law and did obeisance and kissed him, and they asked each other of their welfare, and they came into the tent.

And Moses told his father-in-law all that the Lord had done unto Pharaoh, and to the Egyptians for Israel's sake, and all the travail that had come upon them by the way and how the Lord delivered them.

And Jethro rejoiced out of the hand of pardon me rejoiced for all the goodness which the Lord had done to Israel whom he had delivered out of the hand of the Egyptians.

And Jethro said, Blessed be the Lord who has delivered you out of the hand of the Egyptians and out of the hand of Pharaoh who had delivered the people from under the hand of the Egyptians.

Now I know that the Lord is greater than all gods, for in the thing wherein they dealt proudly, he was above them.

And Jethro, Moses' father-in-law, took a burnt offering and sacrifices for God.

And Aaron came and all the elders of Israel to eat bread with Moses' father-in-law before God.

Well, we already know that he is the father-in-law.

Well, when Moses killed an Egyptian, he had to flee for his life.

Well, we read in Exodus 2 verse 15, Now when Pharaoh heard this thing, he sought to slay Moses, but Moses fled from the face of Pharaoh and dwelt in the land of Midian, and he sat down by a well.

So when Moses fled that first time and he ran away from Egypt, he ran all the way to Midian which was east of Egypt but the south of Canaan.

And this is where he would meet Zipporah his wife.

Let's keep reading in Exodus 3 in verse 1.

Now Moses kept the flock of Jethro his father-in-law, the priest of Midian.

And he led the flock to the backside of the desert and came to the mountain of God, even to Horeb.

So we read very clearly here that Jethro, he was the priest of Midian.

And even though they were not the chosen people of God per se, this man was a worshiper of the true God and we see this in his act of offering a burnt sacrifice to God when he came and met Moses and all the Israelites and the elders they came and they ate together he offered a sacrifice to God to thank God for their protection for their safety and all that God had delivered them from Moses had recounted to him about the Red Sea, about the plagues, about that whole experience and even their part of their experience in the desert, right?

He was praising God on behalf of Moses for all that God had done for them and for the Israelites.

And we see clearly here, friends, that the Israelites are not the only ones that were the true worshippers of God.

They were not the only ones that were blessed with the knowledge of God.

We also see that many people out there are true worshippers of God as well.

You know, We've read this book before, God and the Ancient Chinese.

I've read this book, not we, but I've read this book before called God and the Ancient Chinese.

And how it talks about even the Chinese characters, they talk about the knowledge of the God that we have in the Bible.

It talks about how these characters explain and point to how we see these characters in the Bible as well.

And so I'm not, I don't understand anything really about Chinese but we see there that even the ancient Chinese people, they had a knowledge of the true God.

Buddhism actually was not the religion of the Chinese.

But you see, friends, there are people all around the world that may not be Christian, but they also have a true understanding of God as well.

Even in the Bible, beyond here what we're studying this evening, remember the wise men that came from the east, they came to look for Jesus, the first advent of Christ, when they came and saw him and found him in Bethlehem in a stable.

So God, he's working on people all around the world.

He's giving everybody a chance to believe in him.

And So Moses, he had plans to lead the children of Israel out of Egypt as a general.

And the Israelites were to be his army, but God had other plans.

He led him to this family, not just to hide from Pharaoh, but also to be retrained in his heart and mind, to give him a clearer understanding of his will and to shape his character to be a true leader.

And this God did by leading him to Jethro and to his family.

And so, let's continue with the story, shall we?

Let's go back to Exodus chapter 18 and now let's read verse 13.

And it came to pass on the morrow that Moses sat to judge the people, And the people stood by Moses from the morning unto the evening.

And so we see here that Moses he is sitting before the people and basically he was a judge, He was a teacher, he was a prophet, he was the leader of the nation.

He was basically everything to the Israelites.

And so the people, they would come to Moses for help, for instruction, for advice, and from morning to evening, we saw that Moses, he would be busy leading them, teaching them, instructing them, even settling disputes between them.

Look, we must remember that the children of Israel, they came out of Egypt as what?

They'd been slaves for close to 400 years.

This was a nation of slaves, and there was no order.

They didn't even have a system of governance for themselves.

They didn't even have freedom back in Egypt to make these sorts of decisions, right?

So this was a new experience to all of them, a newfound freedom that they never had before.

And so they were going through the growing pains.

They were asking Moses for maybe even the smallest of things.

They had no idea to run this whole nation and so they were all just crowding around Moses asking for help from morning until evening.

The Law and the Covenant

We ask for a blessing that you would enlighten our minds as we read your word that we might have wisdom to know how to apply it to our lives today.

So lead and guide us, O Lord, is our earnest plea and prayer.

So as I said earlier, we are continuing our wilderness wanderings And the title of our study this evening is entitled The Law and the Covenant.

What was the purpose of God to give the law to the Israelites?

You know, God, He's about to form a legal agreement between him and between the people that he's brought out of the land of Egypt.

They're still just this nation of slaves.

There's really not much governance and so God is trying to order things now and he's been leading them all the way from Egypt to Mount Sinai.

He's been protecting and caring for them as parents would for their children.

And now God calls upon Moses as the leader of the Israelites to go up to the mountain to speak to him.

And he has a message for them through Moses.

Let's go to our first text found in Exodus 19 verses 4 through 6.

Now therefore if ye will obey my voice indeed and keep my covenant, then ye shall be a peculiar treasure unto me above all people.

For all the earth is mine and ye shall be unto me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation.

These are the words which thou shalt speak unto the children of Israel." So God reminded them of how he had already helped them, how he had been caring for them, and now he is about to ask them if they want to be his people.

He says that if you obey my voice and keep my covenant, then he would make them a peculiar treasure above everyone else on the earth.

Did they want to enter into a covenant with Him?

Let's keep reading Exodus 19 and verse 8.

And all the people answered together and said, All that the Lord hath spoken, we will do.

And Moses returned the words of the people unto the Lord.

You know, without hesitation, they made that agreement and entered into a solemn covenant with God.

They pledged themselves to Him, to accept him as their ruler and their God.

Exodus 19 and verse 9 What did God want to do here?

God wanted the children of Israel to listen in to his conversation that he's about to have with Moses.

His purpose was to magnify and honor Moses in the sight of the whole nation so that they might be careful to stop murmuring against him and blaming Moses for every small problem that would come up.

So instruction was given for some important preparation.

We read here in Exodus 19 verse 10 and 11, And the Lord said unto Moses, Go unto the people and sanctify them today and tomorrow.

Let them wash their clothes and be ready against the third day, for the third day the Lord will come down in the sight of all the people upon Mount Sinai." They had to wash themselves, they had to wash their clothes.

God would come down on the third day to give them ample time to prepare before he came.

They needed even to set up boundaries to make sure they didn't come near the mountain upon which God was coming to or else whoever touched the mountain would die.

And look at what we read here in verse 16 to 20.

And lightnings and a thick cloud upon the mount, and the voice of the trumpet exceeding loud, so that all the people that was in the camp trembled.

And Moses brought forth the people out of the camp to meet with God.

And they stood at the nether part of the mount, And Mount Sinai was altogether on a smoke, because the Lord descended upon it in fire.

And the smoke thereof ascended as the smoke of a furnace, and the whole mount quaked greatly.

And when the voice of the trumpet sounded long, and waxed louder and louder, Moses spake and God answered him by a voice.

And the Lord came down upon Mount Sinai, on the top of the mount, and the Lord called Moses up to the top of the mount, and Moses went up." So what do we see here?

All the people, they get to see the conversation that God has with Moses.

This is probably the first time in the history of the world that we see God speaking publicly to such a large group.

Look, he's communicated to man before but you know it was with a small group with Adam and Eve, with Noah, with Abraham and Jacob but this is the first time he's coming in such a public manner to a whole nation.

Everybody gets to see and hear that communication that Moses has with him.

And truly, Moses is magnified in the sight of everybody.

But not only that, this is the first time they get to hear their Deliverer.

You see, God was to them this pillar of cloud, this pillar of fire.

There was no speaking except through Moses.

But now everyone would hear God speak and would see his awesome majesty and his presence.

It's right after this that God actually speaks the 10 Commandments to the children of Israel.

He actually doesn't write it down on tables of stone first.

You know, we're most familiar with the tables of stone, but actually, the first time the law is made public to the people is through God speaking to them.

Look at this, Exodus chapter 20, verses 1 and 2, And God spake all these words, saying, I and the Lord thy God, which have brought thee out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage.

And right after this, God enters into the 10 Commandments, of which we are so familiar with.

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