Hebrews: The New Covenant Administration of Christ Max A Forsythe (c) Anno Domini 2005

From the Pulpit at Pilgrim's Rest Presbyterian Church in America

Into the Promised Land
For the Lord’s Day:  the 3^rd of July 2005

Hebrews 11: 29-31

“By faith the people crossed the Red Sea as if on dry land, but the Egyptians, when they attempted to do the same, were drowned.  By faith the walls of Jericho fell down after they had been encircled for seven days.  By faith Rahab the prostitute did not perish with those who were disobedient, because she had given a friendly welcome to the spires. ”

Introduction:  A few years ago, I was working one afternoon to install some ceiling lights here in our then new found sanctuary.  The fixtures were hung, the wiring in this room prepared and all I had to do was go up the ladder in the bathroom and run the wires down from above.  Unfortunately, there was a wall of unfinished two by fours between the attic and the ceiling at this end of the house.  All of a sudden, there was a major problem.  Years before I had crawled into similar spaces to lay out wiring in two different houses.  Once I even inched my way on my back in about fourteen inches of crawl space to poke wires up through a floor.  But, by the time we get to the year when we needed more light in our brand new house church, I could no longer fit between the two by fours!  So I had to call for help and my assistants were able to go where I could no longer go!

In our text today, the ancient Egyptians had a similar dilemma.  The problem with the Egyptians in our first verse today is not one of physical or military ability and bravery, but of spiritual acumen.  The Apostle tells us that they were not of the faithful and thereby they must be swept away by the very flood waters which fled before the people of God.  This is not the first time in the scriptures where the faithful were lifted upon the same waters which destroyed the ungodly.

Development:  However, the Apostle records this example from the Exodus to prove that the escape of Israel from Egypt did indeed involve a general appreciation of the faith commended by Moses and his brother Aaron.  If we go back to Exodus 14: 13-14, we quickly note that Moses gave the people of Israel three commands:

 "Fear not,"
"Stand firm,"
"See the salvation the Lord."

Even as the Apostle would argue from the book of Hebrews in his time, if God is indeed on our side, why should anyone fear man, beast or devil?  Had Israel so quickly forgotten the power of their God in deliverance from Egypt?  When we likewise come into the Kingdom of God we are awed by the presence of the Spirit in us.  However, once the afterglow is gone and life becomes regular again, how easy it is for us to relearn old habits.  How quickly our habits can revert to former sinful ways. 

Well does the psalmist say that the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, because we must all learn to put aside our dependence on worldly wisdom if we are to comprehend the Spirit of God as we learn to fear Him who may destroy us with the wicked in the fearsome eternities of Hell, unless we like Israel and the early church take Moses' second instruction here to “stand firm.” Like Israel we too must learn to stand firm in the faith and believe that God will indeed fight our battles for us.   In the Exodus passage we can read the plain fact that: the Pillar of Fire stood between the people and the Egyptians during the night. 

In our day, we are more fortunate to know also that the Lord Jesus Christ stood between us and death when He went to the cross to die for our sins.  As we consider this ancient event where God provided salvation for His people we should remember that it is God's plan, it is God's action and it is God's will that makes both physical and spiritual salvation possible.  That is what Israel would see in the surprising rescue that unfolds before their very eyes.

In verses fifteen to thirty of the Exodus account we see that God is indeed able to divide the waters by miraculous means.  The sea shore is even dried by the Divine wind.  The children of Israel were able to cross over the crust of dried mud to the other side of the Sea of Reeds. 

However, when the Egyptian chariots drove into the waterless void the Septuagint translation tells us that “their wheels were clogged.”  With the return of the waters, the Egyptians were swept into the sea and died.  Now, the important part of that Exodus passage is in verse thirty-one:  “Israel saw the great power that the Lord used against the Egyptians, so the people feared the Lord, and they believed in the Lord and in his servant Moses.”  Not only did that generation of Israel believe in the awesome power of God, but so have members of every generation since.  This crossing of the sea became a cardinal affirmation of the Old Covenant faith.  Israel remembered this event as God's final deliverance from slavery in Egypt.  In time the fulfilled promises of the past affirmed their belief in the promises of the future for the coming of the Messiah.

And the Apostle, writing to the Hebrews in the years after the crucifixion of Christ, would assure the people of his time, as well as ours, that: in the same sense as we look back to God's deliverance from sin through the cross of Jesus Christ we are enabled to believe that God can and will bring us through our difficult times today.  Like Israel and the early church before us, we have only to fear God, stand firm and watch as God unfolds our salvation before our own eyes.

Our second verse for today reminds me of something that happened in the aftermath of last winter’s ice storm.  Late in the spring, one of the boys rented a stump grinder to help with the final clean up in several yards.  Two of the stumps we ground down were just a few feet away from our patio.  The patio stones were laid many years ago on top of gravel and sand.  A stone wall along the outside edge was laid out more recently. 

Once, the grinding began the whole area shock from the vibrations of the machinery.  After the stumps were ground down to sawdust, the whole stone wall and first courses of cement spacers were shaken out of their proper place and when time allows, it will be several days correcting.  Now, we can understand the uses to which God was able to give the marching and stomping of the Israelites, but still – however it happened, perhaps with a little help from an earthquake – the walls of Jericho came tumbling down.  The forces of nature and the people, after all - had only a small part to play in the working out of God’s providence!  What made them take the march around the walled fortress: the clear instructions of God through His servant Moses.  And what the people were incapable of doing militarily, the Lord accomplished in and through His own divine power.

Application:  Now, we can well understand the direct influence of the works of God upon the minds and hearts of the people who saw these events over forty years in the wilderness.  Nevertheless – many who saw and heard did not believe.  But years later, another person – not of Hebrew birth, and by all accounts a wicked servant of a mythical god came to believe the reports circulating throughout the whole Middle East.  We speak of course of Rahab the prostitute priestess who rescued the spies that Joshua had sent into Jericho.  Listen to her heartfelt testimony: “We have heard how the Lord dried up the water of the Red Sea before you when you cam out of Egypt, and what you did to the two kings of the Amorites. … And as soon as we heard it, our hearts melted, … for the Lord your God, he is God in the heavens above and on the earth beneath.”  (Joshua 2: 10-11)

Now, because of her religious profession – she well knew the necessary magic to make the local myths come to life, and just the same, she knew the utter powerlessness of the pagan deities she had formerly served.  But, the reports coming out of Egypt and also out of the wilderness made her realize that the God of Israel was no mere speculation, nor formula for making a profit.  This was a real God to be reckoned with!  And so by faith, she gave her allegiance to the God of Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Moses and Joshua.  Thereby she came into the house of Israel and being especially blessed – into the godly line that would ultimately lead to Christ.

Seeing and believing is the theme of the Apostle here in our short verses for today.  The people who traveled with Moses saw and heard things never known before or since – some believed when the heard the voice of God, others did not because they presumed only that the noise they heard was merely thunder in the heavens.  Rahab, did not have the experience of Israel, but nevertheless – she believed and it was counted to her as righteousness.

Our final point for this morning is simply this; God does not change the methodology of bringing people to faith down through the ages.  The Apostle’s list here may very well be similar to our own media award: the Oscar, which is given for a brilliant and spellbinding performance before a watching world.  Even a celluloid Moses stood above the common crowd of movies back when Cecil B DeMille produced the epic story based upon the reports of God’s revelation.  And, a world less jaded then, recognized the brilliance of the performance and gave a modern, even worldly acclaim to the acts of God in brining His people out of Egypt. 

One of the things we need to keep in mind in this regard, is that Moses, as well as every human who ever served the Lord of hosts – was only a supporting actor!  However, we can take heart and encouragement in the works of the saints listed here, because above every pithy comment I might make, and above the brilliance of any modern commentary – still it is ever and always God who acts in history.  And just as the people of the Apostle’s time needed to be encouraged, if the God of heaven and earth could accomplish all that he has from a handful of Old Covenant saints, so may He again in their day as well as hours do the same, if we and they would just believe that God is, and that He has a purpose and He will use us His will to accomplish in every time and place.  May we, like the people to whom Hebrews was written – take these admonishments seriously and go on to believe that God continues to accomplish His will in and through us, whenever we are obedient to His commands.  Amen.

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PREACHING RESOURCES
Bruce, F.F.  The Epistle to the Hebrews.
The Holy Bible:  English Standard Version.

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