Address—G.H. Hayhoe
DISCLAIMER: The following has been auto-transcribed. We hope it will help you to find the section of this audio file you are looking for.
I'd like to turn first of all to a verse in Jeremiah chapter 10.
Jeremiah chapter 10 and verse 23. O Lord, I know that the way of man is not in himself. It is not in man that walketh to direct his steps.
And I'd like to turn over to the 11TH of Hebrews.
Hebrews, Chapter 11.
And verse 23.
By faith, Moses, when he was born was hid three months of his parents, because they saw he was a proper child and they were not afraid of the King's commandment.
By faith, Moses, when he was come to years, refused to be called a son of Pharaoh's daughter.
Choosing rather to suffer affliction with the people of God, than to enjoy the pleasures of sin for a season, esteeming the reproach of Christ. Greater riches than the treasures in Egypt. For he had respect unto the recompense of the reward by faith He forsook Egypt, not fearing the wrath of the king, for he endured as seeing him who is invisible.
Through faith, he kept the Passover and the sprinkling of blood.
Lest he that destroyed the first born should touch them by faith they passed through the Red Sea, as by dry land, which the Egyptians are saying to do, were drowned.
Well, the young people, I'd like to speak this afternoon a little bit about the life of Moses. I believe we can learn very many wonderful lessons from the life of this man. In the meeting this morning we were taking up about the Lord Jesus. We know He is the perfect example. He is the one who began and completed the pathway of faith in perfection. There was no one that was perfect but Him, and He is the one that we should.
Before us as the object in everything and in every decision that we make. But we do have in this 11TH chapter, those who did walk the path of faith, not in perfection, but in this way. They're men of like passions with ourselves, and they perhaps help us to understand our own pathway in a better way because of what they had to meet. And having still the flesh in them, we learn.
That they needed to learn lessons in the school of God, and we all have to learn in the school of God. In fact, every one of us. The moment we are saved, we enter that school and God has His way with us. There's an individual tuition for each one of us. No two of us are exactly alike, and so the Lord is taking into account.
All about your pathway. Moses had no choice where he would be.
Born, perhaps if he had had his choice, it wouldn't have been to be born in a position where he was, where there was such persecution against the people of God. He would have chosen to have a perhaps easier and different path. And perhaps some of us here might be sort of.
A little bit upset of the circumstances in which we are found, and maybe our home life hasn't been all that we would desire it to be. Maybe in the assembly where we live, there aren't all the situations that we think are the most conducive to Christian growth. But I say again that God has His hand in every circumstance. The way of man is not in himself.
There was only one person who could choose where he would be born.
And that was the Lord Jesus, and he chose to be born in a Manger. He chose to take the lowest place. He chose to go through this world. As we have been reminded in our meetings, meeting all the situations that we meet only sin apart, We have to meet them. And we're conscious that we still have the flesh within us, but we also have, if truly the Lord's, a new life. Yeah, it's the very life of Christ that.
We possess, so we can't say that we're without power because we're we have the life of Christ and we're indwelled by the Spirit of God. We may not be using the power, we may at times allow that fallen nature to act, but God has made full provision for us.
And so I just like to look at this life of Moses in the practical way that it can apply to us and some of the things that we too can learn in the pathway of faith. And I believe if we profit by these things, it will be for God's glory and our blessing. It tells us whatsoever things were written aforetime, were written for our learning, that we through patience and comfort of the Scriptures might.
00:05:22
Have hope. So everything that's written about Moses was written for me. It was written for me to prophet and for you too. And for each one of us. We can learn something of God's ways, of his patience, of his grace, of the mistakes that we make, and of the patience of God. And so I say, let us look at the life of Moses in this particular way.
Someone has said that Moses who lived to be 120 years old, his life was divided into 3 parts and we don't know how long we may be left here. But I suppose whether our life is short or long in some measure, these three parts have a place with every one of us.
We may be learning some of the things concurrently, that is together. We may have to learn some of them separately, but we do have to learn those things that it was necessary for Moses to learn. And it seems in general that we seem to have to learn them in much the same way, in the same order. I mean, as Moses did, it has been said in the 1St 40 years of his life, he was learning to be somebody. He was learning.
To be an important individual in this world, to fill an important place as he felt, and to do something in this world for himself and perhaps for others.
And then the second part of his life, he was in the backside of the desert. And I suppose we would say in those forty years that he spent on the backside of the desert, how they were years when, as a natural man might look at them, they almost seemed like wasted years. What good was he doing to himself or to anyone else minding the flock of Jethro, his father-in-law, on the backside of the desert?
He might have said all these are just wasted years.
And there might be some young person here who would say, well, I can understand getting my education and preparing myself for life are very important. But I've sort of come to a standstill and I can't see any good coming out of these years at all. I'm not learning anything and it just seems that I'm humdrumming on through life and nothing is really being accomplished.
But those were very necessary years in the life of Moses.
40 years, a long time. But I suppose with most of us, we don't even learn that in 40 years. Well, what did he learn? He learned that he was nothing. And I suppose many of us will admit that as long as we have lived, and I've lived a few years more than 40, I still don't know whether I've learned that lesson very well. So it does take us a long, long time.
To even begin to learn that we're really nothing.
And then in the last 40 years of his life, he was learning that God was sufficient for every circumstance that it was possible for him to meet individually or God's people collectively. That was perhaps the brightest part of it all. That was the lesson that was really very important if he was going to have that which would be an abiding and useful life. And we have to learn that too.
We have to learn, dear young people.
People that what really counts in our lives is, as we have this morning, when we give the Lord His rightful place and when we give the Lord His rightful place in connection with all our dealings, not only in connection with our everyday business and affairs, but also in connection with the people of God that.
Sometimes seemingly a much harder one because when we set out to do so.
Thing and be useful for the people of God. That kind of a life too, is not without its frustrations and disappointments, and Moses experienced that in the last 40 years of his life.
Well, I just mentioned this briefly in order that we might think of Moses life in this way and that as I say, we might fit it into our own lives and think of how God is teaching us these things. It says in Job who teacheth like him there is no one else. When I tried to teach my children I was either too harsh or too easy. I wasn't always wise, but you know God.
00:10:14
Always knows.
What is just right for us never makes any mistakes, and we can say confidently with the psalmist As for God, his way is perfect. What is really going to count is that we accept the things that God allows and profit by them, as it says in the 8th chapter of Romans.
Looking at it in a natural way, it says.
We are for thy sake, we are killed all the day long we are accounted as sheep for the slaughter. And the next verse says nay, nay, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him that loved us. Do you feel that all day long you're being killed, that everything seems to be going wrong? He says no, that's not the way it is at all.
Those things that seem so killing, so difficult, so upsetting, they are not really intended for that purpose. But the next verse says in all these things we are more than conquerors. We not only find in the Lord the grace to rise above the problems and situations of life, but we can profit by them and we can profit by them for time, and we can profit by them.
Eternity. When our lives pass into review, what is really going to count is that which has met with the Lord's approval.
Well these 40 years, then the 1St 40 years in Moses life, as I say, he had no choice where he would be born. He didn't have any planning to do, nor do you and I. And have you been placed in a situation that you say, oh I wish that I hadn't been brought up where I am. It's so difficult in the place where I live, the district where we live. The meeting is a hard.
For a young person to be well, Moses didn't have any planning to do about that at all. God planned it, and it was in a very, very difficult time. And anything but what he would have desired. Because any person, any man of faith would have desired to be in the land of Canaan, that good land, that land flowing with milk and honey which God had promised to his people. And who of us wouldn't like to be brought?
Up in a home where there was plenty and where there wasn't sickness, and where things were favorable, nice father and mother, a pleasant assembly, and all these kind of things, That would be our natural choice, wouldn't it? But when Moses was born, it was at a time when a decree had been passed that all the baby boys who were born were to be thrown into the river.
Perhaps we're living in a similar day today.
Perhaps we're living at a time when the enemy is making a special attack on our young boys. Because it's God's intention that the boys should take the space, the place of leadership, that they should be the ones who take that place and give the example so that when the time comes, if it's God's will that you should have a home and that you hold that place in love and.
And in a way that shows that you are prepared to be a godly leader in your home and two, in the assembly, that you should think about how you perhaps can be someone who would be useful and give that kind of godly leadership that is so necessary. Well, the enemy didn't want these boys to grow up to be anything like that. They didn't want to see somebody grow up to be like Moses, who was.
Willing to risk his life in order to help the people of God. Certainly King Pharaoh didn't want anything like that to happen. And I say to you boys.
The enemy doesn't want you to present this kind of leadership. He's going to bring everything possible into your life to destroy that so that you will not be conscious of the place and responsibility that belongs to you as a young man whom God has given that place of responsibility.
Well, Moses was born at just a time like this, when it was the plan of the king to throw all these boys into the river. And now perhaps I might just speak a few moments to those who are young parents, because although this is an address to young people, I know that there is some here who allow your marriage. You're perhaps still, if you weren't married, you'd be considered a young person.
00:15:18
So I'm going to just say a few words to you that.
But here we're told that when Moses was born, it says that he was hid three months of his parents because they saw that he was a proper child. I speak to young parents here and if you love the Lord and God gives you children.
I'm sure that the whole plan, as far as the world is concerned, is how to fit your children into the country where we are, whether it's the United States or Canada, that they would become useful citizens and that they would make their mark in life, that they would climb up to be something. As we look at our children, whom the Lord has given to us, we do have a responsibility in regard to their clothes. We have a responsibility.
In regard to their education, their health and many other things, to see that they develop properly and are happy in the home. But I say, have we looked upon our children as being, it says here, a proper child, or as we have in Acts Chapter 7 where we find Stephen addressing the crowd there, he said.
That he was exceeding fair, the margin says fair to God.
Do we, do we realize that our children, whom God has given to us, are fair to him Now they're born into a wonderful place of privilege. Scripture even speaks of them as being holy, That is, relatively they're not to be brought up just like the world. They're to be brought up as a separated people who belong to the Lord. Do we as young parents realize this? Do we look with real serious?
Minds on our.
Children, well, this this did a little made it necessary to do a little planning.
The decree had gone out that these boys were to be thrown into the river. And so it tells us here that he was hid three months of his parents. In other words, they sought to protect him as long as they could from all those forces that would seek to ruin him. And I say to young parents, there are all these forces at work. Do you and I?
Parents try to protect our children against these things. Do we do what they did? They made this little ark of bulrushes and they pitched it within and without with pitch, and they put that little ark in the water and hid it there among the reeds by the river's bank. In other words, they it seemed to me that they recognized that this child was born under a sentence of death, and now they were going to.
And see that it was protected because they wanted to recognize that, but they also wanted to recognize that God was above every situation and was able.
And we need to be fully aware of the day in which we live are surrounded with everything that marks death. But we see them as brought into this place of privilege and favor. And so they sought to protect their child. Well, you might say it, it was an impossibility. Well, you know, God is a God of impossibilities. With God, nothing shall be impossible.
The very person they would have feared the most to come down to the rivers brink.
And find that child was the very person who did it.
Why, they might have thought some stranger would come down, but Pharaoh's daughter. Why, what a dashing to their hope. Sparrow's daughter to find this child. But the King's heart is in the hand of the Lord, as the rivers of water. He turneth it whithersoever he will do. I hear some parents say it's impossible in a day like this? Oh no, nothing's impossible with God.
Maybe the situation and the person you fear the most. Maybe.
The very one whom God uses as a means if you count upon him and they counted upon God. We're told here by faith. He was head three months of his parents. And so I would just seek to encourage you that you might have that faith, that confidence that counts upon God. You look at circumstances they see most frustrating and disappointing. But when you know that God is the God of circumstances.
00:20:00
That he's above everything, that nothing happens by chance, and that he is able to make the wrath of man, to praise him and to restrain the remainder of wrath, as the scripture says he's able. And he was able here. And so instead of the child being thrown into the river, it's taken out and given back to its mother to bring up.
Oh, how wonderful are the ways of God. And I just say this little word of encouragement to young parents, Don't be discouraged. We're living in dark days. The Lord was brought up in Nazareth, and when Nathanael talked about Nazareth, he said, can any good thing come out of Nazareth? To be brought up in a difficult day and to be brought up at a time when things are very hard doesn't mean that God isn't able.
He's above everything, the most high rules in the Kingdom of men and gives it to whomsoever he will.
And so a little child is brought up, brought to Pharaoh's court, and the mother is given the privilege of being the nurse. So here again we see the hand of God even behind the child's education, because we were told in another place, and that Moses was learned in all the wisdom of the Egyptians, and was mighty in words and deeds.
Now all this might have seemed like a preparation for him.
Him to take a place on behalf of God's people, because now he would become a person of influence in Egypt. He was probably in line to be the next Pharaoh. He was probably one who would have had a great deal of influence on behalf of God's people if he had remained in his position.
In fact, as another has said, Providence put him in that position, but faith took him out of it.
I say that again. Providence put him in that position, but faith took him out of it. Did God want to improve conditions for his people in Egypt? No, He wanted his people to leave Egypt. Does God want us to improve conditions in this world? Is that why he's left us here? No. The Christian camp set the world right. We're not intended to set the world right. We're intended to set individuals.
If I can use the expression set them right with God.
But we have nothing to do with setting the world system right. The world is under judgment. It's condemned, and you and I have no part in setting it right. As Mr. Darby said, we have no principles to act upon. The world's principles all center around self, and God's principles all center around the glory of His beloved Son. And so we have nothing to do with setting it right.
Moses received his education. All you say the children are exposed to terrible things in their education. Well, I think that there must have been the soul with Moses too. It must have been very, very unpleasant situations to which Moses was exposed, living in that dark land. And there certainly would be no influence connected with God or His rights or the Bible or anything like that in the court of Pharaoh where Moses was educated.
Was God able to preserve him? Yes, yes, He was. Is he able to preserve us? Is He able to preserve you, dear young people? Oh, indeed He is. He's able. He's able to do exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think. And may the Lord encourage you to be faithful. I'm sure as Moses was receiving his education.
There were a great many thoughts going through his mind. What am I going to do?
When I'm through here, what am I going to be the pharaoh of Egypt or am I going to cast in my lot with these despised people of God? And that's the way it is when we're growing up. We we have all kinds of.
Shall I say little individual fights with our own conscience and decisions to be made, and we go through a kind of upheaval as we are looking at things. What are we to do? We can't just live on the example of others. As a matter of fact, Moses had no one on earth really to look to except his parents. But if he was going to be faithful to the Lord, it was going to cost him something.
And it always costs something to give the Lord his rightful place. I can't promise you, dear young people, that it's going to be an easy path.
00:25:01
We must through much.
Tribulation enter into the Kingdom of God unto you. It is given on the behalf of Christ, not only to believe in Him, but also to suffer for His sake. And as you go through all these turmoils in your mind about just what you're going to do, how you're going to decide to go on in life, may the Lord grant that you will come to the decision that Moses did when he was come to years.
Now of course come to years in Moses life.
40 years of age, but he lived a lot longer than most of us could ever expect to. You may come to years. You may come to this decision in your life, perhaps fairly young. You may come when you decide that you have to know what kind of work you're going to follow. What is your choice going to be about, what you're really going to set as your goal in life.
Paul set for his goal.
The Lord Jesus In the next chapter we're encouraged to set for our goal the Lord Jesus well.
Moses had a decision to make and when he was come to years, it says he refused to be called the son of Pharaoh's daughter.
His first decision was a -1. We usually find it's the same thing. I believe that's why the Bible says cease to do evil and then the next one learn to do well.
If you find yourself in a wrong position. If you find yourself in some.
Association or some friendship or whatever that you know is wrong. Don't wait and say, well if I can see a way out of this then I'll take it Now cease to do evil. Moses had to come to a decision not knowing how things would work out at all. Refusing to be called the son of Pharaoh's daughter could have meant anything for him.
He was, I say again, making a negative decision.
And at least one thing I know that I'm not the one to be in the position of the pharaoh of Egypt. I belong to God and I belong to his people by association. And this is no place for me. Is there any young person here? And you're just in that spot today. You know that.
What you have decided to take up and go along with is not really a position or a path in which you can honor the Lord. And then I say, by God's grace, cease to do evil. Look up to the Lord, make this decision in your mind, and ask the Lord for grace to carry it out, even if you've got away.
When Naomi was down in the land of Moab.
She had been there about 10 years.
God had been speaking to her and to her family, and at last she realized that first of all, she must forsake Moab. That was no place for her to be. And it says she went forth out of the land of Moab. Or is she going to be received in the land of Canaan? She didn't know. He didn't know whether they'd welcome her back or not. And they certainly might be very displeased when she brought Ruth back with her who was a Moabite.
Now that would only make her less favorable, as she might have thought.
But you see, God is behind everything. He's the God of circumstances. And when they left Moab, then God worked out the rest. ** *** was received very lovingly. When she came back, Ruth was received too. God was able to work out all the problems, but the best thing was to leave MOB when they knew MOB was wrong. And dear young people, if you know the position you're in is wrong, I say to you.
This afternoon, cease to do evil.
I can think of other people in our own generation and they first of all discovered the position they were in was wrong. They didn't say, well, if something better opens up or if I can see how this will go, I'll take the step. No, cease to do evil. He refused to be called the son of Pharaoh's daughter. He was not that. He was in the light of faith. He belonged to the people of God.
Actually, he was the tribe of Levi, the ones whom God had set apart.
To be used for him and to approach to him.
So we find here that he refuses to be called a son of Pharaohs daughter. And then it says he chose rather. What did he choose?
00:30:06
He refused something, but now he chooses. And what he chooses is not, as we might say, to have a good time with the people of God. Sometimes we hear it brought before young people. Well, you can have a good time following the Lord with God's people. Well, you can. That's very true. And I look back on a very happy life for which I'm thankful to the Lord. But don't make your decision on that basis.
Oh no.
Because it may be very frustrating and disappointment. You may not have such a good time. There may be a lot more problems than you anticipate. Because God doesn't promise you that it's going to be an easy path. Those who make a decision in Russia to follow Christ don't make a decision on the idea that it's going to be an easy path. They may be banished to Siberia. They may have to suffer in prison for Christ's sake.
And who can tell that if you make a decision to follow Christ, it's going to be easy? I say that it may not be, it may be and it may entail a path of suffering, but that was the decision that he made. He chose rather to cast in his lot with the despised people of God. Was read to us this morning.
Let us go forth therefore unto him without the Cam bearing his reproach.
God doesn't promise that our pathway is going to be an easy one, but in contrast with it, he saw an easier path. He saw pleasure. He saw that there were those that were, so to speak, having a good time, but it was for a season. And that's the way with all the pleasures of sin, they're all for the season. The pleasures of sin are in the act. There's no pleasure afterwards.
Many, many young people.
People who are trying to indulge in the pleasures of this world are finding out to their own sorrow that they don't satisfy. Don't envy them, dear young people, They haven't got what really satisfies you. And I who know the Lord Jesus as our Savior, we have that which truly satisfies the heart. It may not be an easy path, but as we had in the meeting this morning.
There can be joy.
The time when the Lord Jesus rejoiced in spirit, we noticed was at the very time when it tells us that Moses that when it tells us that the nation turned away from him and he accepted the rejection of the nation as from the Lord. And sometimes the happiest moments of our lives when we are when we have learned to look up and say.
Lord, I accept it from Thee, And the peace with which he floods the soul, the joy that He gives, more than compensates for anything that we might have given up. And so he chose rather to suffer affliction with the people of God than to enjoy the pleasures of sin for a season. And then it says he did see something worthwhile living for.
Esteeming the reproach of Christ. Greater riches.
Than the treasures in Egypt.
He refused and he chose, and now he esteemed. He had a proper sense of values, and we all have a sense of values. When I crossed over in the United States, I had to realize that the Canadian dollar wasn't as valuable as the American dollar. We have to get a sense of values. When I go to buy something at home, I give a dollar and it's accepted as a dollar, but not here. It's not the same. And you know, we can.
Have a wrong sense of values in spiritual things too. And here we find that he had a proper sense of values. He esteemed the reproach of Christ. Greater riches than the treasures in Egypt.
And you and I have to learn this. What do we really esteem worth while? Is it to get along? Is it to be at the top of the class? Is it to be well thought of by all our friends? Is that what we're striving for? Is that the thing that really counts to us? Well, not with Moses. He, it says he esteemed the reproach of Christ greater riches than the treasures in Egypt, to be despised for the name of Christ.
Was worthwhile to him, and so isn't it so with us?
And if you've never experienced it, you have missed something. There is a joy that the Lord gives in the confession of His name. And when we have a right sense of values, as Paul did to him, he looked at everything as to how it would appear when it was manifested at the judgment seat of Christ. And that's the way we ought to look at the things that we do through the day.
00:35:28
How is this going to look?
When it comes out at the judgment seat of Christ.
That's why Paul could say we labor that whether present or absent, we may be agreeable to him. How is your life and mine? How are the things we did today? How are the things we did on Thursday and Friday and Saturday going to look in that day when they're manifested in the presence of the one who gave his life to have us with himself?
That's what really is going to count how they appear in man's day.
Is relatively unimportant, and I was reading about Christopher Columbus, a very notorious name in history, but he ended his life in absolute sorrow and disappointment and disgrace. Was was it worthwhile for him to do all those things? Well, it certainly gave him honors in the beginning, but at the end it was all lost. And if he didn't have Christ as his savior, his life which has.
Put his name in the Hall of Fame has been a lost life. And dear young people, I plead with you, live your life for Christ in view of eternity.
Esteeming their reproach of Christ. Oh, you say people laugh at me and I just can't take it. I can't take it to have people laugh at me. Ah, but isn't it better to have the Lord's approval in that coming day to have him?
Say, Well done, thou good and faithful servant, to know that you did what was pleasing to him, O dear young people, that's what really counts. He had respect under the recompense of the reward. He he counted it what the Lord would recompense as being far better than all the riches of Egypt, and all the pleasures of Egypt, and all the glory of Egypt.
And Saul, then he made a final decision. He forsook Egypt, not fearing the wrath of the king. How could he do it? He endured as seeing him who is invisible. Now that's where faith comes in. Faith makes real to us what we haven't seen. First verse of this 11TH chapter says now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.
That is, faith makes real to us what?
We haven't seen, and that's what we need. We need to have those eternal things made real to us, and they're made real by faith.
Does God speak the truth? Does he mean what he says? Does it really count?
Well, we're going to find out in that coming day. And I've often said, surely any Christian at the end of his life who has followed the Lord will say, I'm certainly glad I did. No one who has chosen the easier path will say, oh, I'm glad I went after the world. It really got me somewhere.
Oh no, it really counts to follow Christ.
And to live for him. So it says he refused, he chose, he esteemed, and then he endured, it says.
He endured as seeing him who is invisible. And we were talking this morning about endurance. It's that endurance that's going on. Well, Moses now had made his decision. He goes to the backside of the desert and there it seemed like 40 wasted years. He was minding sheep. Oh my, what a what a let down for a man who has learned in all the wisdom of the.
A man who had.
Tried to deliver God's people, for he had really tried. It says he tried to set them at one when they were quarreling. And now to think that this man has been rejected. But notice what it says about him in Acts. It says he set himself up as a ruler and a judge.
And may I just say a little word of precaution? Sometimes when we get overzealous as young people, we set ourselves up as rulers and judges.
00:40:00
And we don't like it when people kind of turn away from us. But perhaps it's the attitude that we have shown Moses. It says he attempted to be a ruler and a judge. He tried to correct things by his own energy. I've seen young people do this.
Really well meaning young people and they try to do things in their own wisdom and in their own strength. And Moses now 40 years in Egypt and graduate from the schools of Egypt, learned in all the wisdom of the Egyptians. He can handle any situation. No, he couldn't. He couldn't handle a smaller situation with the people of God. And I want to tell you, dear young people.
All the wisdom of this world will never help you to handle the problems of the Christian life.
No, never, much less among God's people. We need the wisdom that comes from above.
So they turned against Moses, who tried to be a ruler and a judge.
Feeling it's absolutely used to us. He threw up his hands, as it were, and is there some young person and you say I cried. It's no use. I really meant well and the Lord knows my heart. And so there he spends those 40 years now on the backside of the desert. They seemed like wasted years, but they were necessary years because God was emptying him of himself.
He was showing Moses that what he required.
If he was going to use him, was not all the wisdom of Egypt, not all that zeal that would set himself up as capable to handle any situation. Oh, no one young man who really wanted to serve the Lord. He said he wasn't going to be. He wasn't going to try to be a help. He was going to be a help. Well, he was very frustrated and disappointed before very long.
You and I have to learn without me.
Can do nothing.
Well, back in the backside of the desert, it seems that God passes over those years in comparative silence.
He got married back there.
He had two children, but he was learning. You can tell by what he named his children. The first one he named a stranger here, and the next one he called. God is my help.
Oh, that was nice, wasn't it? A stranger here. Yes. That's all we are in this world. We're strangers here. But God is our help. That's what God was teaching him. And we need to learn this. Dear young people, We're strangers here, Peter says. We're strangers and we're pilgrims, but God is our help. God is our help. And so at the end of those 40 years, the Lord appears to Moses on the backside of the desert and says.
Moses I've seen the affliction of my people, which are in Egypt.
I think Moses didn't think that God had seen it.
Largest act to say he hasn't seen all the problems that I'm having to meet and the way people have acted toward me when I really tried all these things. Surely if God saw them, He would do something for me. And the Lord after 40 years comes to Moses and said, Moses, I've seen it, I've seen it. You didn't think that I had seen it, but I have. I know their sorrows.
And I am come down to deliver them. Moses is learning now.
That he is nothing and that God is everything.
Is there some young person and the Lord is passing you through something like this in your life and you're finding out that you say I tried. I've watched the lives of quite a few young people. I've seen them start out and they've tried too. But you know, God has to show us sooner or later that we can't do anything in our own strength. Without me, you can do nothing.
Nothing, and it means nothing. And Moses now.
Coming to this point, and the Lord says, Moses, take off the shoes from your feet. The place whereon you stand is holy ground.
I've seen what's going on in Egypt, and now Moses, seeing you have learned something of your own nothingness. Now I'm going to send you. And it's interesting what the Lord says, the one who wanted to be a ruler and a judge, the Lord sent to be a ruler and a deliverer.
Quite different, isn't it? To be a ruler and a judge of God's people is one thing. To be a ruler and a deliverer? I've been very much struck. I may have mentioned this before, but I think it's been some help to me in my Christian life. A little remark that I read in Mr. Darby. He said Christianity is known by what it brings, not by what it finds.
00:45:09
Just think about that a little bit. You find certain things that are discouraging and disappointing. What do you bring? What do you bring? What did Moses bring? All. He came back, not a person who was going to slay an Egyptian and have a quarrel with one of his brethren, but he was going to come back now to be useful because God had shown him that he couldn't do anything, but God could do everything.
He could.
Undertake their 'cause he didn't need to have, he didn't need to have.
Moses as the next Pharaoh to deliver them. Oh no, he was going to use them. He was going to use his own power. And if Moses was content to be nothing, then he could use him too. And so we find that God uses Moses now. He has been emptied of himself, and you notice when God calls him.
This same man who had been mighty in words and deeds, after 40 years in the school of God, he says, Lord, I can't even talk.
He said. I'm a man that's slow of speech.
He wasn't that way when he came out of the school of Egypt. He was mighty in words and deeds. If you'd been listening to him, you'd say that's an accomplished young man, he's got a good future ahead of him. But after the school of God, a man that can't talk, No, you can't talk unless the Lord gives you something to say. If any man speak, let him speak as the oracles of God.
Let us learn that, brethren, that we can't say anything right unless God gives us even the very words to say.
He teaches us entire dependence upon Him.
And so now Moses is picked up and used of God. God uses him to show in the land of Egypt those mighty signs and wonders.
And we find how that king Pharaoh did his very best. Now to keep those people in Egypt, he used different attempts to try and keep them there. He first suggested that they would worship in the land, and then he suggested that they wouldn't go very far away. And then he suggested that they would go.
And.
Just the man would go and leave the mothers and children back there. But Moses said now we're going to go that every bit of us, we're going to go ourselves and our children. We're going to take our flocks with us all to your young people. We belong to Christ.
If you get married, be sure you marry a Christian. Bring up your family for the Lord, and don't enter any business where you can honor the Lord. We must. If we're going to be happy Christians, we must acknowledge His claims over everything. And so we find here.
That Moses here is used of God to lead the people out and lead them through the Red Sea. It's very interesting what it says here about Moses. It says in the 28th verse, through faith he kept the Passover and the sprinkling of blood. To me that's very interesting little comment. Was Moses better than the rest of the people?
Now he needed the blood on his door just as much as any Israelite.
And I only stand here because I'm redeemed by the precious blood of Christ, not because I'm any better than anybody else. I needed the shelter from the judgment myself, and every individual needs it. And Moses needed to remember that. And now he leads the people out.
And now what is he going to learn in the wilderness? He had realized his own emptiness on the backside of the desert. Now he's beginning to see that God is everything. And now he leads the people through the Red Sea. Surely now, after he's learned these things in the school of God, things are going to go comparatively smoothly for him. Did they?
Did they? If you set out to follow the Lord Jesus, am I telling you that it's going to be a path where you'll be accepted and everybody will appreciate you and really value you and what you do? Oh no. Moses had to learn that if he was going to be used among the people of God.
He had to be gone very humbly. He had to realize that things were not going to be easy. True, when they crossed the Red Sea, they all sang together. Then sang Moses and the children of Israel this song unto the Lord, saying, The Lord hath triumphed gloriously, the horse and the rider hath he thrown into the sea. But it wasn't very long until.
00:50:15
They were complaining and blaming Moses and.
When they came to Marrow, where the waters were bitter, and when they came to the place where there was no bread and no water, they began to get blamed. They began to blame Moses. Well, you say I tried and they blamed me. Even the things I tried to do, I got blamed. Instead of being, instead of being appreciated, I got blamed. So what did Moses do? Did he say, oh, it's no use?
I know it's no use to set things right in each Egypt, but it's not.
Before you was trying among the people of God, either the Lord, he came to the Lord and he said, Lord, what shall I do? These people are ready to stone me. What stone the man whom God is now using. Yes, you may face that too. You may not be appreciated, but the Lord said to Moses, go on before the people, go on. And I want to say to you.
Go on, I say to some of the young people who are getting a little older. Go on.
Seek to be a help. You may get discouraged at times because you may not always be appreciated, but remember to have the Lord before you and to be doing what's pleasing to Him is what really counts. Then later on the people fell into the worship of the golden calf and the Lord said Moses, I'll destroy these people and I'll take you and your family, and I'll make of them a nation. Oh no, Moses.
Said please don't take these people. I love them. I want them to be brought into. Sometimes we can become very selfish even in the things of God, and Moses is learning these things where he's learning that God is everything.
He's seeing that God is teaching him even in the wilderness, and that there are joys and there are sorrows in seeking to serve him and follow Him. And then we find too, that.
They rose up against him on different occasions, and we find that Moses turned to the Lord and said, the Lord said Moses, you lead the people through the wilderness and bring them into the land. Moses said, I can't do it unless thy presence go with me. Carry us not up thence all dear young people, These are some of the things that the Lord is seeking to teach us. And as I look down.
On the young people that are here, maybe the Lord will come before you get very much older, but he may leave us a little while. And oh, what I desire as I look into your faces, is that you would seek to go on for the Lord. And I'm sure that these things that Moses learned, every one of us are going to have to learn if we're going to in any way.
Be useful to the Lord. Let me say them again. We're.
We're perhaps going to try and be somebody great in this world and do things in our own strength, and we're going to be frustrated. And then perhaps the Lord will show us that we're really nothing. He'll bring us right down. He'll bring us to the point where we realize that without Him we can do nothing. And then we'll have to learn. And we still need to keep on learning.
That he loves his people. He loves them to the end.
Never give up.
When the Lord said to Moses, Moses just go on before the people and it's lovely to see young people just go on steadily growing in grace, seeking to live to please the Lord. I know that some of you are placed in assemblies where they're very small. Some things have happened in the assembly that are hard to take, but it's nice to see young people at seat to go on, have the Lord before them.
Realize that to have.
His approval and to please Him is what really counts. Well, may the Lord encourage you dear young people. The path may not be easy, but I am sure of this, that at the end when we look into the face of our blessed Savior and see Him face to face, the things that will really count are not those things that may seem very important here in this world.
It's those things that have his approval and surely if there ever was a need.
Among the people of God it is today. There's a need in the city where you live. There's a need in the school where you go. There's a need in the assembly. May each one of us be desirous to be used in some little way for the Lord and for His glory in the little time that remains to us. I say there's one who walked the path of faith perfectly, but I believe we can learn as we read of these others.
00:55:22
That which would encourage us.
Because we fail. We're like Moses, but we have an unfailing captain, the captain of our salvation, the Lord Jesus. May we keep our eyes upon him and press on.
So we sing that little hymn, 312. Lead on, Almighty Lord, lead on to victory. Encouraged by thy blessed word, with joy we follow thee, 312.