The God of Moses — Robert Constable

Knowing God Rather Than Knowing About God

The God of Abraham and the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob this week, and we're going this morning to be thinking about the God of Moses. And I had originally intended that tomorrow, perhaps, to think about the God of Daniel, but I have changed my mind.

I've changed my mind because I want to be real sure you people get the point. We are not just studying to learn things about God. The purpose of this series is to help us to know God, not to know about him.

And so tomorrow I'm going to talk about the God of you, the God of you. And perhaps that will focus all that we have been saying through the week and bring it home to us. The God of Abraham was a friend of Abraham.

Shall I hide what I'm going to do from Abraham, my friend, he said. He was Abraham's friend. The God of Moses spoke of Moses in these terms that his relationship with Moses wasn't like it was with other men.

God said, I talked to Moses face to face. That's a new kind of relationship. It was the relationship of a companion and a friend and a co-worker. To begin today, we're going to go from the book of Genesis into the book of Exodus.

Moses at the Burning Bush

Let's turn to Exodus, chapter 3, and we'll read the first few verses of this chapter and of the 6th chapter. Moses kept the flock of Jethro, his father-in-law, the priest of Midian. And he led the flock to the back side of the desert and came to the mountain of God, even to Horeb.

And the angel of the Lord appeared unto him in a flame of fire out of the midst of a bush. And he looked, and behold, the bush burned with fire, and the bush was not consumed. And Moses said, I will now turn aside and see this great sight, why the bush is not burnt.

And when the Lord saw that he turned aside to see, God called unto him out of the midst of the bush and said, Moses, Moses. And he said, Here am I. And he said, Draw not nigh hither. Put off thy shoes from off thy feet, for the place whereon thou standest is holy ground.

Moreover, he said, I am the God of thy father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob. Moses hid his face, for he was afraid to look upon God. And the Lord said, I have surely seen the affliction of my people which are in Egypt, and have heard their cry by reason of their taskmasters, for I know their sorrows.

And I am come down to deliver them out of the hand of the Egyptians, and to bring them up out of that land unto a good land, and a large, unto a land flowing with milk and honey, unto the place of the Canaanites, and the Hittites, and the Amorites, and the Perizzites, and the Hivites, and the Jebusites.

God’s Covenant Name and Israel’s Deliverance

Now turn to chapter 6, verse 1. Then the Lord said unto Moses, Now shalt thou see what I will do unto Pharaoh. For with a strong hand shall he let them go, and with a strong hand shall he drive them out of his land.

God spake unto Moses, and said unto him, I am the Lord. And I appeared unto Abraham, unto Isaac, and unto Jacob by the name of God Almighty. But by my name Jehovah was I not known to them. And I have also established my covenant with them, to give them the land of Canaan, the land of their pilgrimage wherein they were strangers.

And I have also heard the groaning of the children of Israel, whom the Egyptians keep in bondage. And I have remembered my covenant. Wherefore, say unto the children of Israel, I am the Lord, and I will bring you out from under the burdens of the Egyptians, and I will rid you out of their bondage, and I will redeem you with a stretched out arm and with great judgment.

And I will take you to me for a people, and I will be to you a God, and ye shall know that I am the Lord your God, which brings you out from under the burdens of the Egyptians. And I will bring you into the land concerning the which I did swear to give it to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob, and I will give it you for an heritage.

I am the Lord.". Well, this is quite an introduction to the God of Moses. Before we get into this, I'd like to do a little bit of review on the way we have come. We have been in the book of Genesis so far this week.

From Relationship to Responsibility in the Pentateuch

The book of Genesis is the book that sets forth the fact that there is a relationship between man and God, or between God and man. That's the purpose of the book, that's the theme of the book, and the stories that are in the book of Genesis are to underline this theme that man is related to God.

You come to the book of Exodus, however, and you have a different theme. Naturally, the theme is advancing. And in view of what has been written in Genesis about our relationship to God, the book of Exodus talks about our responsibility to God, because relationship always leads to responsibility.

Now, just for the sake of your thinking and for any research you want to do in this, it's wonderful the way this theme goes on through the Pentateuch. First, responsibility in Genesis. Then, I mean, relationship in Genesis.

Then responsibility in Exodus. And in the book of Exodus, we learn that the responsibility of man to God is to worship him and to serve him. So, having established that in the book of Exodus, the book of Leviticus talks about how we are to worship God.

We have a responsibility to worship him. How are we going to do this? Well, the book of Exodus tells us how to do it. Also, we are told in Exodus that we have a responsibility to serve God. How are we going to do this?

Well, the book of Numbers tells us how we are to serve God. So, you can see the structure of the Pentateuch, the way it's been given, to tell us about the relationship that it seems between us and the Lord, the responsibility that grows out of that relationship, and then how to fulfill the responsibility in its two principal aspects.

And then the book of Deuteronomy is the book in which God reveals the fact that all of this is because he loves us. That's the first time God reveals his love to the people is in the book of Deuteronomy.

And he says there that this is the reason for it. They were nothing. He didn't choose them because they were great, but because they were small, and because he loved them and loved their fathers, and therefore he made all this provision, and he's made all this revelation.

So, it's really great the way the Bible gets off to a start like this, a well-organized start that you can really follow it and know what it's about. Now, there are three things in the book of Exodus that I want us to be thinking about this morning, but before we get into that, I want to comment about this statement in the third verse of the sixth chapter, where God said, I appeared unto Abraham, unto Isaac, and unto Jacob by the name of God Almighty, but by my name Jehovah was I not known unto them.

Jehovah, the God Who Becomes What His People Need

This is an interesting statement, because now we're going to get a new revelation of God in his name. In the Old Testament, he was known, I mean in the book of Genesis, he was known to those old saints as God Almighty, that is Elohim, and it spoke of his essential might.

The fact that God was God Almighty, and he was able to do what he proposed to do. That's the God of Genesis. It wasn't just might for its own sake. It was might made available to the people of God. God was Almighty for his people, and he did great things for them.

Now we come to the book of Exodus, and right away here we're introduced to God under a new name. He said, the people of Genesis didn't know me by my name Jehovah, but this also is my name, and this has to do with God's essential being.

Not his essential might, but his essential being. That he is God, and so he introduced himself to Moses at the bush as I am. That has to do with his essential being. That's his name, Jehovah. But not just that he is, but that he becomes all that his people need.

You see, these names of God aren't just descriptions of God, they tell us of God's relationship to us. That his name has to do with us, and so now we're going to learn to know him as Jehovah. He is the becoming one, the one who is all that his people need him to be.

The Exodus, the Law, and the Tabernacle

Now, as I said, in the book of Exodus there are three principal things in the book of Exodus. They are the exodus, that is the deliverance of the people of God from Egypt. That's the one thing. Number two is the giving of the law, and number three is the giving of the tabernacle.

These are the three great subjects that are dealt with in the book of Exodus. Now, interestingly enough, the Gentile concept of God was a concept that was arrived at meditatively from nature, or from natural phenomenon.

The people looked about them, and they saw what they saw in nature, and they made up their minds, God must be like that. Now, this was never the way the Hebrew people got their concept of God. Their concept of God came from revelation.

It did not come meditatively. But also, their concept of God came from what God did, his activities. And so, the people of Israel learned to know God from his actions. You remember that verse that says, he made known his ways unto Moses, and his acts unto the children of Israel.

This is the way God revealed himself to his people. Now, the exodus and the law and the tabernacle were all given to men through Moses. Moses was the executive here. God selected this man in order to use him in these three great things in the book of Exodus.

Moses Trained by Egypt and His Mother’s Faith

Now, Moses had some intimations of the fact that he was going to be used of God. Last night, as we were being shown the pictures of Egypt, you remember, the point was made, and made strongly, that Moses refused to be called the son of Pharaoh's daughter, esteeming the reproach of Christ greater, richer than the treasures of Egypt.

Moses, as he grew up, sensed the fact that he was something special in the mind of God. I love the study of the life of what is said in the word of God about Jacob, his mother, and what she had to do with the teaching of Moses about the God of Abraham and Isaac and Jacob.

Moses was learned in all the wisdom of the Egyptians, we're told, and in Josephus' history of those times, he says he was mighty in word and mighty in deed. He was a great man in Egypt, but for all of that, the thing that stayed with him was what his mother told him about the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.

And I can't say this without saying the tremendous importance of pouring into the ears of the children what God has revealed of himself to us. Moses was in a, you know, we get afraid to send our students to the university because of all the unbelief and all the stuff that's taught to them in the schools that is apt to undermine their faith and all.

If you think you've got a problem, what kind of a problem do you suppose Jochebed had? She had to turn her baby over while it was still a baby. She nursed the child and told him of the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.

But all around were the priests of the temples of Tarnac. He went to the university there, he was well trained, and they were all pouring around all the time about the gods of Egypt. All the time were the stories of the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob that had been sunk deeply into the soul of Moses and all the priests.

Oban could not at all affect his heart. Oh, so important. Well, anyway, that's not what we're talking about. But this is the kind of a start that Moses got. And he had, as he learned about this God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, his heart went out to God.

Moses Learns to Serve God God’s Way

And he thought, oh, what a God he is, and I want to be lined up with him, even if it means throwing aside everything, every advantage I've gotten, aligning myself with these oppressed Jews, these oppressed Hebrews.

Hebrew is a person with no right. That word came from Egypt. And he gave up everything, all his rights, everything else, to align himself with the people who were the slave people. And he started out to serve God, his own way, his way.

He made a great decision that he would not continue as the son of Pharaoh's daughter. He had a great idea. He'd like to set these slaves all free. And he had a great heart for these people. But he set about to do it his own way.

Do you remember the stories, how he went out and he killed somebody in the process of delivering him from one of the Egyptians? His way. So often, this is the trouble, so often this is why things go awry.

We start out to serve the Lord the way we think we ought to do it, instead of waiting until we get guidance and direction and help from the Lord. And he does his work through us. Moses started out big in Moses' sight.

And he was an utter and a miserable failure, because he started his way. And so the way things turned out, you know, he had to leave the country and he went to the back side of the desert there, where he acted as a shepherd over Jethro's flock.

For 40 years he was out there, 40 years, while God made his ways known unto Moses. He said to Moses, that is not the way it is to be done. You do it my way. And then one day he's out for a walk, and we read about this, out with the sheep.

And he sees this bush ablaze but not burning. And he turns aside and God speaks to him, and God says, now I have heard the affliction of my people down in Egypt, and I am come down, you know, I am come down to deliver them, and I want you to go to Pharaoh, and I want you to get them out of Egypt.

Moses said, not me! Didn't you hear about what happened? He said that I should go down and deliver them. Well, God purchased it. God said, you're my man. I've chosen you to do this. I want you to go. And I'll be with you when you go.

Now go back and do it my way. And look at chapter 7, verses 4 and 5. God says that Pharaoh shall not hearken unto you, that I may lay my hand upon Egypt and bring forth mine armies and my people, the children of Israel, out of the land of Egypt by great judgment.

And the Egyptians shall know that I am the Lord when I stretch forth mine hand upon Egypt and bring out the children of Israel from among them. Now, this is great. Why did the Lord want to do it this way?

Why was he not satisfied to have Moses do it his way? Because the main thing with God was that people get to know him. That's why. And he was going to do it in such a way that not only would the Israelites know that God had done it, but that the Egyptians would know that God had done it, too.

God Reveals Himself Through His Actions

You know, that's why God has us in the world. This is why God is working through us and his people. He is trying to make himself known to the people in the world. He wants them to know. Now, another interesting thing in chapter 15, on this little point, is something God says.

Well, God doesn't say it, but it is said in the song here. Chapter 15, verse 11. Listen to this. Who is like unto thee, O Lord, among the gods? Who is like unto thee? Glorious in holiness, fearful in praises, doing wonders.

Thou stretchest out thy right hand, the earth swallowed them. Thou in thy mercy hast led forth the people which thou hast redeemed. Thou hast guided them in thy strength unto thy holy habitation. The people shall hear and be afraid.

Sorrow shall take hold on the inhabitants of Palestina. Then the dukes of Edom shall be amazed, the mighty men of Moab. Trembling shall take hold upon them. All the inhabitants of Canaan shall melt away.

Fear and dread shall fall upon them by the greatness of thine arm. They shall be as still as a stone till thy people pass over, O Lord, till thy people pass over which thou hast purchased. Thou shalt bring them in and plant them in the mountains of thine inheritance, in the place, O Lord, which thou hast made for thee to dwell in, in the sanctuary, O Lord, which thy hands have established, and the Lord shall reign forever and ever.".

Now, this is the people of God when they have been delivered. This is their song, but they are singing to God about the effect of what he has done. And the point I want to make is that in this one verse it says, "...sorrow shall take hold on the inhabitants of Palestina.".

Now look at Joshua, chapter 2. This is a good bit later, of course, some 40 or more years later. In verse 9, Rahab, the woman who lived in Jericho in Palestine, said unto the men, "...I know that the Lord has given you the land, and that your terror is fallen upon us, and that all the inhabitants of the land faint because of you.

For we have heard how the Lord dried up the water of the Red Sea for you when you came out of Egypt, and what ye did unto the two kings of the Amorites that were on the other side, Jordan, Sion, and Od, whom ye utterly destroyed.

And as soon as we heard these things, our hearts did melt, neither did there remain any more courage in any man because of you. For the Lord your God, he is God in heaven above and in the earth beneath.".

Yeah, this is great. What they sang about back here in Exodus was taking place right then. The word was going out all over the earth in those days about how great God was because of what he was doing for Israel.

And way off in Palestine where they were ultimately to go, they heard about God and they were afraid because they knew he was the God in heaven that ruled in the affairs of men. God was making himself known.

They shall know. And this is what God is always trying to do. This is what God wants to do. God wants to be known. He wants people to know about him. You know why? Because that's what will bring them to trust him.

Revealing God Through Trustworthy Lives

If people don't know God, they're not about to trust him. Tell a story about Moody once. He was walking out in the country and some friends were walking along with him, and one of the men had his little boy.

And he would take the little boy and set him up on a post. There were posts along the road. He set him on the post and he'd stand like this, and the little boy would jump into his father's arms. And they do this at each post they came to.

Then Moody came over and he said, let me do that. And he picked up the little boy and he put him on the post and he said, jump. Oh no, oh no, that little boy wasn't jumping into some stranger's hands.

He waited till his father came over, then he jumped. That's the way we are. That's the way people are. They'll jump when they know who they're jumping to. They'll believe in who they know they can believe in.

And that's why it is so important that in our context, with men and women in the world around us, they get to know God through us. If they see that we can trust him, then they'll get the idea they can trust him.

But if we go around worried all the time, you know, concerned about everything that's going on, their opinion is we must not be much of a God, they're about as worried as I am. No, it's as we reveal God in the activities of our lives, that people will come to put their trust in him and come to know him.

And this is what God wants. Hereby shall ye know. He says in the book of Joshua, how were they going to know God? Well, they were going to know him in that instance, because the river Jordan suddenly stopped flowing.

And everybody knew rivers don't do that. But when they wanted to cross, the river stopped, and the land got dry, and they walked across, and these people on the walls of Jericho seeing this happen, they knew where they were in trouble.

They knew that these people had God with them, that he was able. Now turn to Exodus chapter 18. When Jethro the priest of Midian, Moses' father-in-law, heard of all that God had done for Moses and for Israel, his people, that the Lord had brought Israel out of Egypt, then Jethro, Moses' father-in-law, took Zipporah, Moses' wife, after he had sent her back, and her two sons, of which the name of the one was Gershom, for he said, I have been an alien in a strange land, and the name of the other was Eliezer, for the God of my father said he was my help, and delivered me from the sword of Pharaoh.

And Jethro, Moses' father-in-law, came with his sons and his wife unto Moses in the wilderness, where he encamped at the Mount of God. And he said unto Moses, I, thy father-in-law Jethro, am come unto thee, and thy wife and her two sons with her.

And Moses went out to meet his father-in-law, and did obeisance, and kissed him, and they asked each other of their welfare. And they came into the tent, and Moses told his father-in-law all that the Lord had done unto Pharaoh and to the Egyptians for Israel's sake, and all the travail that had come upon them by the way, and how the Lord delivered them.

And Jethro rejoiced for all the goodness which the Lord had done to Israel, whom he had delivered out of the hand of the Egyptians. And Jethro said, Blessed be the Lord who hath delivered you out of the hand of the Egyptians, and out of the hand of Pharaoh, who hath delivered the people from under the hand of the Egyptians.

Now I know that the Lord is greater than all gods. For in the thing wherein they dealt proudly, he was above them. And Jethro, Moses' father-in-law, took a burnt offering and sacrifices for God. And Aaron came, and all the elders of Israel, to eat bread with Moses' father-in-law before God.

Jethro Comes to Know the Lord

When Moses left Egypt the first time, and he got out there in the backside of the desert, and he married Zephora, Jethro, his father-in-law, was a Midianite, and he was not a believer in the God of Israel.

But they got along great. And then came the day when Moses told him that God had called him to go back and deliver the people from Egypt. And you read this, and you realize Jethro said, Brother, you're taking on a job.

Deliver those Jews from Egypt? Well, I don't know. I don't know. But you sure you got this straight now? Yes, I know. God has called me to do this. I didn't want to go, but I can't escape God. He insists that I do this.

Well, okay. And off Moses goes. And Jethro, his father-in-law, is at home, and he's thinking, you know, he's never going to see his son-in-law again, probably. He has really taken himself on a job.

Well, in the course of time, here he's coming back. And how is he coming back? All by himself? No, he's got over a million people with him. Six hundred thousand adults and their children. And they come out of Egypt, and they've been delivered, and they've come across the Red Sea.

And they're here now, back again to Mount Horeb, where Moses started. And what's the result? Jethro came to know the Lord. He said, Now I know. Now I know. He didn't know before that God was great, and that he was greater than all the gods of the earth.

And the gods of Egypt. Now he knew it, and he worshipped the Lord. Great, isn't it? This is the way God wants himself to become known. And it says, We reveal God this way, the way Moses did. That we get this kind of result.

Moses’ Changing View of Himself and God

Now we read here that his first son's name was Gershom. Gershom means the son of the rejected man, really. When Moses ran away from Egypt, he married Zipporah. And in the course of time, they had a boy.

And they called him Gershom. And revealed in the naming of their son, the mental attitude of Moses. That is to say, he was feeling very rejected. He was feeling like he had failed. And now he was an alien in a strange country.

Life has passed me by. Then God called him to do this work. And at the beginning, if you know the story, you'll know this, or you may not be acquainted with the details, that when Moses started, his wife and son went with him.

When they started to go to Egypt to deliver the people. And on the way to Egypt, Moses became very sick. There's a great lesson in that, but I'm not going into that now. He became very, very sick. And as a consequence, anyway, he sent his wife and son back to her father.

Said, you better stay here while I go on this trip. And to deliver the people. And so she went back home. And then she had a child, apparently. Moses' son. Now these children were quite far apart in terms of years.

But Moses had never seen this boy. And so when he's coming back with the people, Jethro, his father-in-law, takes his wife and his two sons, and they go out to meet Moses. And Jethro says, I've come now to meet you, and I've brought your wife and your two boys with you.

And Moses called the name of his son, Eliezer. This is the first time he'd seen him. You know what Eliezer says here? God has been my help and delivered me from the hand of Pharaoh, he says. Well, this is quite a change of attitude that Moses has had about God.

At the beginning, he was cast out. He was rejected. He was, you know, a failure in life. But now he's got a vision of God, and he knows God is his help. And this is reflected in the name that he gave his boy.

So he's making progress. Now, when God sent Moses to get the people of Israel, he said an interesting thing in chapter 3, and verse 10. Come now, therefore, and I will send thee unto Pharaoh, that thou mayest bring forth my people, the children of Israel, out of Egypt.

And Moses said unto God, Who am I? That I should go unto Pharaoh, and that I should bring forth the children of Israel out of Egypt. And he said, Certainly I will be with thee, and this shall be a token unto thee, that I have sent thee.

When thou hast brought forth the people out of Egypt, ye shall serve God upon this mountain. That's where they were, at Mount Horeb. In other words, what God was saying to Moses was, You go and get those people and bring them here.

Go and get them out of Egypt. Bring them here to me. And so Moses went and got the people, and he brought them to the mountain. Now look at chapter 19 and verse 8. Going right across all that happened in Moses doing this assignment.

Israel Brought to Sinai to Hear God

Chapter 19. Oh, let's begin with verse 1, shall we? In the third month, when the children of Israel were gone forth out of the land of Egypt, the same day came they into the wilderness of Sinai. For they were departed from Rephidim, and were come into the desert of Sinai, and had pitched in the wilderness.

And there Israel camped before the mount. And Moses went up unto God, and the Lord called unto him out of the mountain, saying, Thus shalt thou say to the house of Jacob, and tell the children of Israel.

Now, the point is here, it says Moses went up to God. God said at this point, Go and get the children of Israel and bring them here to me. Moses went and got them and brought them here, and now he's going up to God to say, All right, I did it.

I've done the job you gave me to do. And he brought the people back to where God said they should be. And God has greatly revealed himself in the meantime. Now, he's got them there. And the next thing is to talk to them.

God brought them there, not just to stand around the mountain, but so that he could talk to them. He wanted to reveal himself to them. Look at 19 .9. And the Lord said unto Moses, Lo, I come unto thee.

We are sorry, but at this point, the conference speaker malfunctioned, and the balance of the message is missing. We thought you would still want this portion of the sermon. We have completed the tape with some recorded organ music.