Go with Boldness

Transcript

This transcript was generated automatically from the audio and may contain small errors.

Well, we are going to be in Exodus chapter 32 today. If you were here with us last week, you might be wondering, like, what's going on? I thought we finished the book of Exodus. We did. We looked at the very end of the book of Exodus last week. We are kind of going back in time just a little bit to talk about a particular incident that happened. It's a really big deal. And in Exodus, there are several chapters devoted to it. There's a lot of things that happen around it, and so we want to really look at it. So we are calling this series Return to God. This will finish our series in Exodus completely. But for these last five weeks, six weeks, we're going to be looking at Return to God. We're going to be focusing on a moment that is a major rift in between God's relationship with his people. And it's a rift that they almost don't recover from. It's a really, really, really, really, really stack a bunch of relays.

Big deal. Okay. It's a really big deal. And as Israel, what we see here in Exodus 32 and following, what Israel is returning to God and in that process of Israel returning to God, God and Moses actually have more than a few extremely strange, enlightening discussions. And it's actually discussions on a level that is rarely seen in all of Scripture, especially the Old Testament, but really in all of Scripture. These conversations are a bit strange. So this week, it's going to be a bit of a strange conversation. Next week, it's going to be a bit of a strange conversation. It's nothing to run from. It's something to embrace, something to look at. But we wanted to make sure that we gave it the time that it needed. And so we kind of left it to the very end of this series, Return to God. I'm going to be preaching a few weeks on it. Drew Ivey's going to be preaching a few weeks on Return to God.

We're pretty excited about it. So with that said, let's jump into Exodus chapter 32, verse one. If you don't have a Bible with you, there's one on your phone. I promise it's somewhere. If you don't want one on your phone, that's fine. There's going to be one on that screen. If you don't want one on your phone or one on that screen, there's a Bible around you in a chair, under a chair. I promise they're black. It's amazing. We're going to be in English standard version, but that's not God's version. You know, whatever. We're, if you've got a different version, that's cool too. Okay. Exodus chapter 32, verse one, it says, when the people saw that Moses delayed to come down from the mountain, let me give you a little bit of context. This is Moses going up the mountain. If you remember, there was a huge, huge deal where God descended on the mountain in a cloud of thick smoke, a very traumatic series of events for anybody

watching it, and there is lightning and thunder and God is answering Moses in the thunder. It's super scary. It's stuff that, that you and I would, would be, I don't care what kind of like military dude you are. I don't care if you always like sit at the restaurant facing the door. You would be afraid. Okay. I'm talking to you guys. I know. I know who you are. You don't even, everybody else knows who you are too. Um, you would be shaking. You would be fearing for your life. You would be afraid. So that has happened. Moses has gone up the mountain and Moses has stayed there, is staying there for 40 days, okay. Three months. You remember what happened 40 days ago? Me neither. Okay. All right. Moses is up there for a while. So when the people saw that Moses delayed to come down from the mountain, the people gathered themselves together to Aaron. Aaron is Moses' brother.

He's a priest. He is the priest of Israel here. Gathered themselves together to Aaron and said to him, up, get up Aaron. Make us gods who shall go before us. As for this Moses, the man who brought us up out of the land of Egypt. Interesting. We do not know what has become of him. Okay. There's a lot going on in that first verse. Israel is tired of waiting and in their fatigue, they sin.

Okay. They are tired of waiting and in their fatigue, that's whenever they're sinning and they tell Aaron to make gods for them. And Israel attributes, this is funny, Israel attributes them, the Exodus leaving Egypt to Moses. No mention of God bringing them out. And so they give all their gold to Aaron and they say, Aaron, make us something. So verse four, and he received the gold from their hand and fashioned it with a graving tool and made a golden calf. And they said, these are your gods, O Israel, who brought you up out of the land of Egypt. Okay. We're switching again. Who's bringing them out of Egypt? First it was Moses. Now it's this golden calf. Okay. So suspend all the negative thoughts you have about like how you would never do this. Okay. Just suspend those thoughts right now. Just, just try to look at it as, as compassionately as possible. Aaron has made a calf.

They instantly ascribe value to this thing and start worshiping it instantly. Okay. And look at five and six. It says when Aaron saw this, when he saw the people worshiping it, he built an altar before it and Aaron made a proclamation and said, tomorrow shall be a feast to the Lord. He's not talking about Yahweh. He's talking about the golden calf. Tomorrow we're going to have a feast to this golden calf. And then rose up early the next day and offered burnt offerings and brought peace offerings. And the people sat down to eat and drink and rose up to play.

That last line, the people sat down to eat and drink and rose up to play. It, it, it's very vague, but it gives us the impression that Israel was doing things they shouldn't have been doing. Okay. That they were unrestrained. Okay. The imagination wanders. Okay. They're doing bad things. Right. So they, they sat down to eat and drink and they rose up to play. It's a feast. So they're likely getting absolutely drunk. Like blackout drunk here. And, and just trying to party as hard as possible. Okay.

You know, the, the freshmen at Texas A&M have nothing on what was going on here. Pastor Daniel has a daughter who's a freshman at Texas A&M. So I'm just teasing, teasing the oysters. Sorry, guys. Just right there. It was right there. I'm gonna pay for that later. Okay. So I want you to notice, yeah, like, yeah, you are. I want you to notice a few things. There's an altar, there's a feast, and there's worship just like God showed them.

Where'd they get the idea for a feast? Where'd they get the idea of burnt offerings? Where'd they get all this idea? They got it from God. So there's this obvious parallel between what God has already commanded them to do and then what they, what they end up doing with this calf. So Aaron and Israel are doing a feast. They are doing kind of religious things here to keep the peace. Because remember, the people are tired of waiting. They're getting a little grumbly. They're getting a little frustrated. They're getting a little tired. So what, what does Aaron do? What do the elders do? What do all of Israel do? They, they make gods to keep everybody happy and quiet.

They do religious things. And if you would interview them, if you would say like, hey, what, what's going on here? They're like, well, like everybody's happy. So what if we made up a God? Does it matter? Aaron and Israel are dealing with God on a level of, of a, of a civil good. Of a peacekeeping thing that it doesn't matter actually to them, what it is, as long as it keeps everybody chill, as long as it makes everybody happy, as long as we can keep people in line and ordered and all that, then it doesn't really matter what we're worshiping. It doesn't matter if it's Yahweh or a golden calf.

That's how Aaron and Israel are acting. God is a civil good. And any God will do. That's what's happening here. Moses deals with God differently, but before we get there, we need to understand God's reaction first, because that's where the text goes next. Now, remember God and Moses are on the mountain and all this is happening at the base of the mountain. Okay. So Moses can't see what's going on at the base of the mountain, but God can. So God breaks it up with Moses. Exodus chapter 32 verse seven. And the Lord said to Moses, go down for your people whom you brought up out of the land of Egypt have corrupted themselves. Okay. I realize we're playing hopscotch here, but are you following yet? Right. So the people say, Moses got us out of Egypt. Then the people say the calf got a value out of Egypt. Now God is saying to Moses, you got him out of Egypt. Interest.

Keep going. So God is referring to Israel as your people. Look at him. Moses saying you, your people that you brought out of Israel. God is doing something inside this conversation. We're getting a hint as to it right now. Cause it's strange for God to say that it's going to get stranger. Let's look at verse eight. This is God still talking to Moses. They have turned aside quickly out of the way that I commanded them. They have made for themselves a golden calf and have worshiped it and sacrificed to it and said, these are your gods. Oh, Israel, who brought you up out of the land of Egypt. The main offense here is idolatry. But let me just, let me just put that in a different form because sometimes we just think of like a golden statue that people are bowing down to. And we're like, I don't bow down to golden statues, Caperton. Like that's not a big like temptation for me.

You know, I don't see a golden statue and be like, can I attribute all value and worth to this thing right now? Oh no, I can't. Okay. Lord, help me with that temptation. That's just not us. We don't go there. That's not what we do. However, however, let's think about idolatry a little bit differently as, as really what it is. It's attributing to something else, what God has done.

Right. So it's, it's attributing to your own work ethic, the career that you have. It's, it's attributing to your moral character, the kind of wedding, the kind of marriage that you have. It's attributing to your hard work as to what kind of children you have. All those things are idolatry. It's, it's giving something else credit that God deserves. That's idolatry.

And although we have obviously a golden calf here, if you would look in our lives, we have golden calves everywhere. We just don't call them that. And they're not made of gold. You know, we're smarter than that. The main offense is idolatry. They're attributing what God has done to something else. Look at verses nine and 10, Exodus 32. And the Lord said to Moses, I have seen this people and behold, it is a stiff-necked people. Now therefore, let me alone that my wrath may burn hot against them. And I may consume them in order that I make, I may make a great nation of you. Okay. Okay. Let's, let's just understand what God just said to Moses.

It's equivalent to hold my beer. I'm, I'm about to do something that everybody is going to notice. This, this won't be okay. I mean, look, I'm kidding with hold my beer, but I mean, God, God is saying, God is saying to Moses, I'm going to wipe everybody out and I'm going to start over with you, just like he did with the flood and Noah. Right. He's going to do it. He openly considers wiping out Israel.

He's done it before with the flood. He almost did it with the city of Nineveh, but, but Jonah, he called Jonah to go preach the good news to them. And if we're reading this, look, our, our spidey senses should be going off here because something weird is happening. God usually doesn't talk this way. God usually doesn't, he's not attributing, he's attributing something to Moses that he knows he did. Something's going on because God is telling Moses, he's saying, let me alone. Do you think God needs to tell Moses to let him alone? It's God in the, in the business of seeking permission.

What is going on here? Because verbally, verbally, God is ready, ready to go. He's ready to just start all over again, but in his action, he waits. Verbally, he's ready to go in his action. He's waiting and many theologians and scholars call this an open door that God is leaving an open door here for Moses. And you can kind of see it whenever he says, Oh, look, I've seen these people behold their stiff neck, which is a, that is a great adjective for Israel. Right. They're stiff neck. That means like they won't be told what to do. Hey, now therefore, let me alone that my wrath may burn hot. Listen, normally, I mean, God's not asking permission. He's not saying, Hey, you know, leave me alone. Go, go over there and don't look while I do this thing over here. He doesn't care who's looking. He just sends an angel and it's done.

And yet something different is happening here. God is speaking in a way that invites Moses into that conversation. He is speaking to Moses in a way that invites him into that conversation. And we see it happen in verse 11. So God has said all this verse 11, Moses response, but Moses implored the Lord, his God and said, Oh Lord, why does your wrath burn hot against your people whom you have brought out of the land of Egypt with great power and with a mighty hand? So Moses reminds God, reminds God that they're his people. This is, this is a strange passage.

Moses is reminding God that they're also his people. Look at verse 12. This is, this is funny. This is just, this is weird. Why should the Egyptians say with evil intent, did he bring them out to kill them in the mountains and to consume them from the face of the earth? Turn from your burning anger and relent from this disaster against your people. Moses's response is think of the Egyptians. What are they going to say?

Think about your reputation among Egypt. You, you brought these people out here just to knife them in the desert. Look, think about how that's going to look. Think about your reputation. This is, this is not a normal conversation that God has with people. This is odd to say the very least, but Moses keeps going. Look at verse 13. Remember telling God to remember something, remember Abraham, Isaac, and Israel, your servants to whom you swore by your own self and said to them, I will multiply your offspring as the stars of the heaven and all this land that I have promised to give you to give to your offspring and they shall inherit it forever.

It seems like, it seems like what we have here that Moses is convincing God of a better plan. And here's what's strange. It works. Look at the next verse 14 and the Lord relented from his disaster that he had spoken of bringing on his people. What do we do with this? What is this? You talk about passages that people don't want to preach out of the book of Exodus. We're here. This is it. This is the pinnacle. Nobody wants to preach on this as a healthy reminder, as a healthy reminder. No one reminds the ancient of days. Nobody reminds God of anything. Right. God doesn't forget. God's not a man that he's like trying to figure his way forward or something. That's not what's going on. Just what do we make of this?

You are. Are we going to say that God was going to do something regrettable and that Moses saved him from that mistake? Or is, is what's happening is God baiting Moses? Not exactly. Not exactly. We need to be very careful here because if we try to just jump in the deep end on this and explain all the mysteries of God, I guarantee you we're going to miss something because it's the mysteries of God. We can't explain it all the way. Nobody can pretend to know the mind of God on this. We know what God has revealed to us in his word, and we can hang our hat on that. We know that beyond the shadow of a doubt. We will live and die on that.

But whenever we start getting beyond that, we need to tread lightly. We just, there's things we don't understand. We don't know. In fact, some very famous theologians as they're writing on this, as they're giving commentary on this verse in particular, they say that God is speaking with a lisp. Any way to say it there, you know, it was written like 800 years ago. It's fine.

But they're trying to say that God is speaking in a way that we understand. And that almost like, think of it like, like we would consider maybe baby talk. Okay. That God is putting things in a way that we can grasp. He's the ancient of days. He has to do that anyway. But something is going on here with Moses. That's difficult for us. If we just read it, kind of just read it at face value. So let's tread lightly, but let's point out a few things. A few things that God is, God is able and justified to wipe people out and start again, anytime he chooses. We don't really get to tell God that's not fair. The flood and Nineveh shows us that he is capable. And we know from the text, and we're going to get into this way more next week. Israel completely deserved it. They deserved to be wiped out. They committed an act of treason against God as a whole people. They attributed what God had just done miraculously in their lives.

They had attributed that to something they just made out of gold. There's not a more treasonous thing to do. They're breaking the second commandment as they were about to receive the second commandment, like it's so bad. And we'll talk about that more next week, but God is able and justified to wipe people out and start over again. It's not, listen, it's not fun to think about. It's not like completely settling all the time. But here's, here's what is that we worship a God who is able. And when his abilities come, they intersect with our need. We're really thankful that he's able. We're really thankful that he's able to cure diseases. We're really thankful that he's able to, to spare people trouble. We're really thankful that he's able to restore his needs. We're really thankful that he's able to restore marriages. We're really thankful that he's able to do all things.

But because he's able to do all things, that means he's able to do other things that we don't like. He's able to bring trouble to us. He's able to make us go through a hard season to teach us something. He's made, he's able to do all those things. His ability doesn't stop at our preference level. God is able. And sometimes that's unsettling. Second thing, God is actively redeeming humanity even here. That God does not change. And even though there is this threat, God's covenantal love continues on. God is at work redeeming humanity. Even here, as he's having a conversation with Moses about wiping it out.

Or wiping out a whole people. So God is able to do that. God is actively redeeming humanity still. And last thing, and I want to kind of land here for the rest of today. God is stirring Moses's heart to mediate between God and his people. God is, listen, God is stirring Moses's heart up in this conversation in a way that really, I don't know if there's a better way to do this. I can't think of another way to actually stir up Moses's heart here. But he is stirring up Moses's heart so that Moses will mediate.

That in this passage, what is happening, God is pointing to a mediator that must save Israel. The picture that we get here is that God is definitely going to destroy his people. And that Moses is the one who stands up, raises his hand and says, no, please don't let it be. Think of, and he begins to appeal to God. Think of your reputation. Think of what Egypt would say. Remember your covenant with God, with these people. Remember all of these things. They're the people that you brought out of Egypt. They're your people. You said that you wanted to be their God and you wanted them to be their people. Your people.

And so God is creating a situation here where Moses, if he's going to mediate, must mediate right then. He must stand up and be counted and say, I will intervene. I will be an intercessor for God's people. And it's similar to what God did, bringing Jonah all the way to Nineveh. If you don't know the story of Jonah, very quick version is Jonah didn't want to go to Nineveh. He hated Ninevites. They were his enemies, right? They were godless people. They were ruthless people. And Jonah goes the other way. God miraculously brings him to Nineveh to preach the good news to them and to repent. And as soon as he says that to the king, the king repents. All of Nineveh repents. And at the end, Jonah is mad. I don't know if you've ever read the book of Jonah. It's four chapters. Totally worth it.

Like the rest of the Bible is not. It's totally worth it. Jonah's mad because he's like, I knew you'd save him. I knew you'd save him, God. I knew it. I knew the moment I stepped on here and what Jonah is saying without saying it is, I didn't want him saved. I wanted him to burn. I wanted him to be your enemies until the grave. But you're compassionate. You're doing something else. Jonah was a mediator that had to go and tell the king of Nineveh to repent. For all of that stuff to unload, for all that stuff to happen, all that good blessing to happen to Nineveh. For some reason, for some reason that we don't understand, God had to bring Jonah himself all the way to Nineveh. And you're like, couldn't God have like sent somebody else to the king? Since somebody else to Nineveh? Maybe. I mean, sure. Why not? I don't know. I'm not God. But for some reason in his mighty plan, he had it to where he needed, he needed

to bring Jonah to Nineveh so that Nineveh could be saved. What is the lesson there for us? What do we see when we see that we should see the same thing that's going on here, that God is insistent on having a mediator happen for somebody to step in for his people to mediate their relationship with him. A mediator must save them. Moses must mediate. And if he doesn't, everybody's dead. That's a good lesson on mediation here.

God is pointing toward that so that we can understand that, so that we can see it. Listen, the only reason that Brody and Melissa could be baptized today, right? It's not because they passed some awesome test of doing enough religious things all in a row, like they didn't make it to 10 Sundays in a row and were like, yay, you made it. Now you get to be baptized. Like that's not how that works. They didn't read their Bible like 20 days in a row and be like, okay, good, 20 days in a row. Let's go. I don't know why I'm like cheering in sign language right now. I am doing jazz hands.

That's not how it works. It's not. It's not that. In fact, in fact, if that's what they understood as salvation, I would not have baptized them. We go through a whole interview process. If they're telling me, you know, Drew, I've, you know, I've read my Bible enough and I feel like I can, I can finally be baptized. That conversation is going to go very differently. I'm going to say, hold up.

Is that what you think saves you? Right? That's not how the conversations went, by the way. There was, they went a lot better than that, obviously. But, but you need to understand the basis of being a Christian is that a mediator came on your behalf, a mediator that you didn't call for, a mediator that you didn't deserve. And that mediator came between you and the hot burning wrath of God, that you and I, in our sin, we deserve absolute death. We deserve torturous death.

I don't even think there's a way I could, I could overstate it. The kind of death that we deserve. And yet, and yet in God's mercy and grace, he sends a mediator, much like Moses in the same vein, Moses is actually pointing forward to this mediator that comes that is Jesus Christ, the Son of God, our Lord and Savior and mediator, that Jesus is the one who stands between us and God. And that friends is the only thing that makes me a Christian.

Jesus Christ standing between me and the hot burning wrath of God. And yes, sure. That is not like super fun to think about. And that's a downer at parties, but it is the truth. It's the truth. It's not, it's not something that's going to make an awesome commercial. It won't get a lot of clicks on Facebook, but it's the absolute truth. That right now, if you don't have a mediator between you and God's hot burning wrath, that you totally deserve, then you will receive it in full and it will not be pretty.

And this is why you see Christians saying things like, like repent or burn. This is why you see street preachers on the corner with a megaphone and a sign that say repent or die. Listen, they're not wrong. That might not be the way exactly I would say it, although I have some really good friends that are street preachers and they love Jesus Christ and they love people and they're gracious, but they are on a corner and they are yelling at people with a megaphone and it's weird. It is, but they're not wrong. In fact, in fact, sometimes the way they live their life shames the way I live my life, because if I'm looking around people that are lost and going to hell, that are lost, that have no mediator, that are facing God's hot burning wrath all on their own, they don't have a leg to stand on. They're going to die. And if that doesn't make you jump out of your skin a little bit, if that

doesn't freak you out just a little bit on the inside, I don't know if you're human. I don't know if you're in touch with like what is happening, that we need a mediator. This is what Christianity is. In light of this, I want to ask you three questions. And I want these to kind of. I want you to move through these. First question. How do you see God? Do you veer into the civil good category? Like, does God just kind of keep the young in line and keep the old comforted and keep things stable?

Like when you start describing like the good that God is, does it sound like a country song? You know, are you just want to buy dirt? Pull a little money in the plate of church. Do what you love and call it work. Like, are we is this it? Is this what we're talking about with like salvation? Is God just another way for you to just like bring people together and make them behave in a way that's acceptable?

That's that's God as a civil good. And let me tell you, if that's your end, any God will do. That's not fidelity to the Lord. That's just keeping people in line. Good byproducts. You got a great school district. But you don't have life. You don't have the kingdom. You get social restraint. Let's not get it twisted. God is building a kingdom of people, families throughout history and geography who follow Jesus and if it's anything like Jesus showed us, the good news of the kingdom is not the status quo. The good news of the kingdom is a disruption.

It is a left turn. Melissa Tunnel a year and a half ago was not thinking, you know what? In the year and a half, I'm gonna get baptized. I'm gonna turn my life around. Everything will be cool. Look, I, Melissa, I don't know you a year and a half ago. I'm guessing it wasn't anywhere near that. And you know what? That's not to say anything bad on you. That's just to say the Lord's good.

Before the Lord found me, same story as you, sister. We're already staying with you. Canals, death. All you guys were just baptized recently. This is our story. Our story is not that we were somehow sort of good enough that we were like patient and held the doors open for people and just like a good person. And we just needed to kind of add Jesus and now we're a Christian. No, no. When Jesus comes to us, he takes our life in a different way. We are building his kingdom now. We aren't just being a good citizen. Building his kingdom does mean that you're a good citizen, but it's a different aim.

How do you see God? Second question. Do you wait on God? Do you wait on God? Israel went to idols when it was tired of waiting on Moses. What do you do when you're tired of waiting? Do you pray? Admittedly, it's not my first move. I may get a little fidgety or anxious or start trying to clean a thing that's already clean or something neurotic, right? Like just kind of go there. I want to give you, I want to give you two parables in our home groups. This semester we were covering parables. We did not cover these two, which is fine. Can't cover them all. I just want to read these parables to you and I'm really not going to say a ton about it. I just want the parables to kind of help you. I'm just going to read them out loud. They're going to be up here. You can close your eyes. It doesn't matter. I just want you to receive this parable.

Okay. Luke 18. He said, in a certain city, there was a judge who neither feared God nor respected man, and there was a widow in that city who kept coming to him saying, give me justice against my adversary. For a while he refused, but afterward he said to himself, though I fear neither God nor respect man, yet because this widow keeps bothering me, I will give her justice so that she will not beat me down by her continual coming. And will not God give justice? No, sorry. Excuse me. I skipped the line.

And the Lord said, hear what the unrighteous judge says and will not God give justice to his elect who cry to him day and night. Will he delay long over them? I tell you, he will give them, he will give justice to them speedily. Nevertheless, when it's son of man comes, will he find faith on earth? Jesus is talking about praying and not ceasing. Jesus likens us to a widow who's just beating down a judge who doesn't care about anybody, but because she's beating him down, she's going to get what she wants. This is how Jesus talks about prayer. I'll give you one more. Luke 11 5 through 13 Jesus said to them, which of you who has a friend will go to him at midnight and say to him, friend, lend me three lows for a friend of mine has arrived on a journey and I have nothing to set before him and he will answer from within. Do not bother me. The door is now shut and my children are with me in bed.

I cannot get up and give you anything. I tell you, though he will not get up and give him anything because he is his friend, yet because of his impudence, he will rise and give him whatever he needs. Impudence means he doesn't quit knocking on the door, even though it's the middle of the night. Okay. And I tell you, verse nine, and I tell you, ask and it will be given to you. Seek and you will find knock and it will be open to you for everyone who asks, receives and the one who seeks finds and the one who knocks into the one who knocks, it will be opened. What fought, listen to this. Listen, this is a great Jesus just riffing here. I love this verse 11. What father among you, if his son asks for a fish, will instead give him will instead of a fish, give him a serpent or if he asked for an egg will give him a scorpion. If you then who are evil know how to give good gifts to your children, how

much more will the heavenly father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him? Look, I hope that you guys understand we are not a name it and claim it church. I'm not saying ask for whatever you want. You're going to get it. God's not a slot machine. Okay. God's not some kind of he's not some soda machine where you put in 50 cents of prayer and get your Coke. That's not how this works. However, God is a father and I don't know. I mean, look, not everybody had an awesome father, but you understand what a good father is. You understand what a good parent is. Right. And when you have a five year old who needs something and he's tugging on the pant leg of the parent and just saying, can I please have this? Can I please have this? And it's not, you know, a machete or a pistol or something, you know, like it's not something crazy. Just like, can I have this thing? And they just keep asking, listen, I think, I think we did an okay job

raising our kids in that moment at Walmart. I'm buying the candy. Okay. Like if it's the 50th time they're asking, I'm like, fine. I'll give you the candy. Listen, do you wait on God? How do you pray when you wait? God invites you to pray like a kid in Walmart who wants a $3 candy. That's how he invites you to pray. He invites you to pray like a friend who doesn't have enough bread that goes over to his neighbor's house and just keeps going, just keeps knocking. Doesn't stop. Just keeps wanting. That's annoying, isn't it? It'd make you get up out of bed. Wouldn't it? That's how Jesus says he wants us to pray.

Like that. That God says, look, you think you can annoy me? Do your worst. Ask for what you need. You think I won't give it to you? You think I won't give it to you in abundance? You think it won't go overflowing? Try me. God says, lastly, um, do you pray with power? I've thought several times about how to say this. I don't, I still don't know if it's good. Every once in a while, like middle of the week, Christie says, how's this going? And I'm like, the sermon has me pinned down. I don't know. I don't know what to do with this thing. Right? Like I'm trying to figure it out.

I will say this. Listen, we're not the mediator, but the Bible says that if you're in Christ, you are a minister of reconciliation. It means that you've got a job to do. It means that people around you who are not reconciled to God, they're looking at you. And look, you and I, we don't save people, but we do share the gospel with them. We do share truth with them in order that we might save some is how the Bible puts it. I know you and I don't have the power to save people, but the Bible thinks it's a pretty okay idea to say that I try to explain the gospel to as many way, to as many people in as many ways as possible in order that I might save some is what the apostle Paul says. Like you and I don't have that power, but you and I do have the power to decide how today is going to go, to decide where we're going to go, to decide who we're going to talk to, to decide how we're going to minister to people, to decide if we're

going to be there to listen to people or be there to just get what we need to target and leave as quick as possible. To just get our coffee and get out of line. To just go to the DMV and suffer in silence or not. To listen to that coworker story again. What if you decided to pray for them? What if you got up and you said, Lord God in heaven, I want today, I want to share the gospel with somebody, you're going to have to bring somebody in front of me. I'm not some salesman. I'm not going to, I'm not going to just, you know, go and like run somebody down over with the gospel. You're going to have to bring them to me. God's like, you watch. You watch. You think I can't do that?

Pray with power. We are not God, but we do have his Holy Spirit inside of us for a reason. God's not pointing you toward a path of doing the right thing. God is in you. God is forming you. God is making you righteous from the inside out. Here's the question. I'm going to call Jacob back up and I just, I just want to leave you with a bit of a question. Part of the reason that Moses and God are having this discussion is so that Moses's heart is stirred up to do what God wants him to do. Now you and I aren't all the way comfortable with that because we like to just read a law and obey it and know that we're doing the right thing. Okay. I understand that proclivity. Um, not personally, but I understand it in other people. You just like, you want to obey the rules. You want to do what's right. I get it. I do. What God is doing here though, and this is a couple of weeks ago, whenever we're

talking about like, what's the difference between wanting my son to take out the trash or wanting my son to want to take out the trash, those two are not the same thing, right? God doesn't want Moses just to be a mediator. God wants Moses to want to be a mediator. Do you understand the difference now? This is where we are. God wants you to follow him. Yes. But God wants you to want to follow him. Are you tracking with me this morning?

The call to follow Jesus is a change of heart, not just a religious. Yes. The call to follow Jesus is a miraculous touch from the Holy Spirit to you where the Lord pricks your conscience and tells you like, Hey, I want you to follow me. I want you to say no to what you've been saying yes to. And I want you to begin to say yes to me in a way that changes your life. And you might have hang ups with that. You might not be sure you might not, you might have some questions on that. But let me just make it as clear as possible. The Lord God wants you to want to follow him.

There are things that are swirling in your own life. And the Lord is bringing them to bear on you to change you, to get your attention. Right now, personally, can I just be honest? Right now, I'm in the middle of being an empty nester and figuring out what what life is an empty nester is. It's weird. OK, it's weird. Some of you know what I'm talking about. And if you don't, you will. It's weird. And and sometimes some days, man, I'm just like, I don't even know, like, what are we supposed to do now? Like, what does this look like? What is the I'm not asking anybody to take out the trash. I'm the one taking out the trash now. Like, what world do I in? But that's a really great thing, right? Some people don't even ever get to be empty nesters. Right. So I'm not complaining at all. I'm just saying it's got me weirded out a little bit. And God is bringing that to bear on my life to bring some things to my attention.

The same thing is happening in your life. I don't know what it is. I don't have to. I'm not going to try to guess. The Lord is bringing something to bear on your life and he's teaching you something through it and you can either respond or you can walk away from it. My encouragement is to respond. Respond where you sit. Respond right now. Decide in your heart that you're going to respond to what the Lord is doing in your life as we pray. My encouragement to you is to bring that thing before the Lord and just say, I need help with this. I need to know kind of what to do next. And look, if you want to talk about it, I'm going to be hanging around afterward. We can talk. That's cool. If not, that's fine. You just if you need more time, that's my encouragement. Tell somebody. Tell somebody you trust. Tell somebody you know, know spiritual things. Tell somebody that you know follows the Lord.

Tell somebody so that you can take that next step so you can figure out like what is the Lord telling me? A lot of times we can't figure out our own problems. We need help. As we pray, ask for help. As we leave, ask for help. In this week, ask for help. Lord, thank you for your help. Thank you that you have made us to not walk this life alone, to not just have to have to figure out some needle in a haystack spirituality that we got to we got to do things the perfect way in the right order. And if we mess it up once, we got to start all over again. That's not. Listen, Lord, we are bombarded with people trying to tell us how to be religious. And your spirit is calling us forward to find life. Help us to say yes to you. Help us to reach out to you, to ask for help this week. It's your day that we pray. Amen.