Moses And The Messiah - [Hebrews 11:23-29]

Welcome to No Compromise Radio, a ministry coming to you from Bethlehem Bible Church in West Boylston. No Compromise Radio is a program dedicated to the ongoing proclamation of Jesus Christ based on the theme in Galatians 2, verse 5, where the Apostle Paul said, �But we did not yield in subjection to them for even an hour, so that the truth of the gospel would remain with you.

In short, if you like smooth, watered-down words to make you simply feel good, this show isn�t for you. By purpose, we are first biblical, but we can also be controversial. Stay tuned for the next 25 minutes as we�re called by the Divine Trumpet to summon the troops for the honor and glory of her King.

Here�s our host, Pastor Mike Abendroth.

The Ten Commandments as a Bible Accuracy Game

Well, when we were having young kids in the house, we always had a game when it comes to the great show, the Ten Commandments. And so in our family, we would watch the Ten Commandments and we would try to figure out what part was true, according to the Bible, and what part was made up, and whoever could figure out the most errors in the movie would win some type of prize.

So I, don�t you wish you were one of my kids, see. I just thought I would go through a few of the things when it comes to the Ten Commandments with Charlton Heston as Moses that weren�t correct, so if you ever have to play this game, you can be the winner.

Moses�s mother in the movie is called Yashabel, while in Exodus 6, she�s named Yaqobed. So there�s an error. The daughter of Pharaoh is mentioned in the Bible only when she rescues baby Moses, but in the movie, she leaves with the Israelites out of Egypt.

Moses had no relationship, according to the Bible, with any of Pharaoh�s sons, although in the movie you can see a lot of interaction. Moses is referred to in the movie as a successful commander, a military commander, but that�s basically lore.

Josephus, the Jewish writer, said something about that, but it doesn�t come from the Bible. What else did I find? The special character named Baka, B-A-K-A, played by Vincent Price, not mentioned in the Bible, but we just had to have Vincent in the movie, of course.

Moses, in Exodus 4, is being portrayed, or is portrayed, as not being very eloquent, but of course in the movie, he�s a great speaker. The story of Korah and the rebellion happens in the movie with the golden calf, so they conflate the thing, and many other things.

What I didn�t do this week is I didn�t study the Prince of Egypt, the cartoon, and see how many errors were in that. I figured there might be too many. There�s so much about Moses in the Bible, so much data.

Moses in Hebrews 11 and the Call to Forward-Looking Faith

What�s important? What do we need to know about Moses? So, if you take your Bibles and turn to the book of Hebrews, Moses is brought up not only in chapter 3 and 4, but also in chapter 11, and when we look at Hebrews chapter 11, we�ll be surprised by some of the things that this preacher, the writer of Hebrews, includes, and what he excludes.

He doesn�t talk about the plagues. He doesn�t talk about the circumcision of blood. He doesn�t talk about the burning bush. He doesn�t talk about God buried Moses on Mount Nebo, and all kinds of other things.

What does he include? And the bigger question today is, why does he include them? If you�re only going to talk about five snapshots of Moses in the book of Hebrews to spur the listeners, the readers, onto faith, why would you include these things?

And so, we�re going to look at today five events in Moses� life designed for you to keep believing, so that in spite of circumstances, in spite of difficulties, you still trust the Lord Jesus Christ, that you take God at His word, that you don�t walk in blind faith, but you walk by faith in the object, the Lord Jesus, who�s presented in the book of Hebrews as not just a king, and not just a prophet, but as the great high priest, a mediator.

We need somebody to stand between God and us, and He is the advocate, or the mediator, the Lord Jesus. What we�ve been doing here in the book of Hebrews is we�ve moved from these great by faith Abraham, who God gave the promise, to now by faith Moses, to whom God gave the law.

It�s very interesting. We move from, in a sense, to Exodus, after we left, what did I just say? I�m not even on any medicine. What can I blame it on? Did you know, they�ve said in the last two weeks, that PowerPoint doesn�t really do any good, and so all these years, some of you wanted me to use PowerPoint illustrations and all that stuff, I told you so.

What they like to say is if you can�t preach, use PowerPoint, so I think that the text is dramatic enough. I think the text is wonderful enough as we look at the story of redemption. We don�t need any kind of props.

God has ordained gospel ministry in a very simple fashion, water, wine, bread, and a book, right? And we can learn everything we need to from that. We move from Genesis to Exodus, from Abraham, the promise, to Exodus, Moses, the law giver.

And if I were to say to you, think like a Jew for a moment, you would be locked in, not only when I talked about Abraham, but Moses. If I began to talk to you, Jewish people, about Moses, you would listen, you would pay attention, you would identify, you would understand what this writer is trying to do to these recipients, and then, of course, everyone else, is he�s trying to say simply this, �Dear person who�s trusted in the Lord Jesus, in spite of the circumstances that you�re going through, don�t go back to Moses, don�t go back to Judaism, don�t go back to the old covenant, because everybody, this is what would be good when I�m able to stand, everybody back here, I can�t stand myself anymore, everybody back here in the Old Testament, Abraham, Moses, and everybody else, they�re looking forward to where you are, and now because you�ve got some trouble, you want to go back to Moses, Moses was looking forward to where you are, because he was looking forward to the Lord Jesus Christ.

Forward-looking faith, the right object of faith, faith in spite of circumstances, taking God at His word. Now, of course, it�s good to know context, and so if you can just go back to chapter 10, you see how 10 ends, and if you know how 10 ends, everything in chapter 11 is much easier to understand.

Do you see in verse 32 in Hebrews 10,. �But recall the former days when, after you were enlightened, you endured a hard struggle with sufferings, sometimes being publicly exposed to reproach and affliction, sometimes being partners with those so treated, for you had compassion on those in prison, and you joyfully accepted the plundering of your property, since you knew that you yourselves had a better possession and an abiding one.

Therefore, do not throw away your confidence, which has great reward. Notice the word again, �For you have need of endurance, so that when you have done the will of God, you may receive what is promised.

He�s telling them, you�re going through difficult times, you�re getting persecuted for your faith, and you want to go back to a time when you�re not getting persecuted, you have to keep enduring. Do you notice that he says in verse 37, I love this verse, �For yet for a little while, and the coming one what a great messianic title, �the coming one will come and will not delay, but my righteous one shall live by faith.

You can almost have a little inkling here that these people were waiting for the Lord�s return, that Jesus would come back, but He hasn�t come back yet, and now we�re going through all this persecution, losing our homes, eventually our lives, if only the Lord would come back, we�re waiting for the imminent return of Jesus, but now we�re running into trouble, maybe we should reconsider Christianity.

He has said in Hebrews chapter 9 verse 8, since you�re there, you can see it, �So Christ also, having been offered once to bear the sins of many, will appear a second time for salvation, without reference to sin, to those who eagerly await Him.

We�re waiting for you to come back, Lord, come Lord Jesus, Maranatha, we�re eagerly expecting you to be the, not the political savior, but the savior of mankind, please come back, and then when you�re not coming back, we�re wondering what�s going on, so He says, �The just shall live by faith.

Don�t go back to Judaism, don�t go back to Moses, Moses was looking forward to your day. So now we come to chapter 11, and remember, chapter 11 is arranged with these clauses that all start with, or many of them start with, �by faith.

Remember, this is a figure of speech called an anaphora, an anaphora is good for memory, it�s good for this kind of an emotional appeal, so you�ll be drawn into it, it�s good to have you just kind of see the inspiration that this writer wants to give through these lists, not just any list, but a redemptive list.

And now we come to our passage today, Hebrews chapter 11, verses 23 through 28, five events in Moses� life, handpicked by the Spirit of God, given to this writer, whether it�s Paul, the author of Hebrews, we�re not exactly certain, but with apostolic authority, five events designed for you to keep believing, keep taking God at His word, no matter what�s going on in your life.

And so here�s what we�re going to do today, dear congregation, we�re going to go back and forth between Hebrews and Exodus, and so maybe you want to keep your thumb or your digital, do you guys use digital stuff here?

Let�s do a good survey, how many people use digital Bibles? Okay, how many people are godly? How many people are self-righteous? I�m just glad you have your Bible. Years ago, you know, we had a man, and he would check out churches by sitting in the parking lot and seeing if people brought their Bibles in, and if they did, he would come in.

And then now, it�s on your phone. Okay, that�s all right. Five events, right? This is not just for these recipients of the book of Hebrews, it�s for you too, because you might not be a Jew, but you go through trouble, and you�re like, well, what am I going to do?

You have to walk by faith, faith in the right object, forward-looking faith. The Lord Jesus said he�d come back for us, he�s not come back, how do we act in the meantime? The just shall live by faith.

Habakkuk, the just shall live by faith. Galatians, the just shall live by faith. Romans, the just shall live by faith. Hebrews, walking by faith, not by sight. So, five events designed for you to keep believing in the life of Moses.

Moses Hidden by His Parents

Number one, verse 23 of Hebrews 11, and it�s not really Moses, but it�s his parents, and there is a tie-in here. �By faith, Moses, when he was born, was hidden for three months by his parents, because they saw that the child was beautiful, and they were not afraid of the king�s edict.

So, we move from dying, dying, dying, in the last three verses, to the birth, to the birth of Moses. Where is this account found where you have both mother and father protecting Moses from wicked Pharaoh?

Where do we find it where you see, regularly, Satan trying to kill the line of the Messiah? Remember back in Genesis chapter 3, there�s going to be the serpent crusher. The Messiah will come, as we get an inkling of God�s redemptive purpose, and we know of course that serpent crusher is the Lord Jesus.

But all throughout history, whether it�s Herod, or in this particular case with Pharaoh, or the book of Esther, God�s people need to be snuffed out so the Messiah can�t come. And here�s an illustration of it.

It�s found in Exodus chapter 1. Let�s turn to Exodus chapter 1. We�re going to be going back and forth between Hebrews and Exodus, and you say, �Well, it�s taken a long time to get through Hebrews. One of the reasons is because we regularly go back to the Old Testament to make sure we understand what they knew very well.

We don�t know what the names are of the parents of Moses in the old first couple chapters, but later we�ll learn their name is Amram and Jochebed in Exodus chapter 6. How did they by faith live? And we�re going to see it�s a tie-in between faith and revelation.

Exodus chapter 1, verse 8. And again, talk about drama. It starts off in chapter 1 with very much drama. �Now there arose Exodus 1, 8, a new king over Egypt who did not know Joseph. And he said to his people, Behold, the people of Israel are too many and too mighty for us.

Come, let us deal shrewdly with them, lest they multiply. And if war breaks out, they join our enemies and fight against us and escape from the land. Therefore they set taskmasters over them to afflict them with heavy burdens.

They built for Pharaoh store cities, Python and Ramses. But the more they were oppressed, the more they multiplied and the more they spread about. And the Egyptians were in dread of the people of God.

What�s the backdrop for this? The Abrahamic covenant where God says I�m going to make you into a great what? Nation. And no matter what kind of persecution happens from other kinds of people, God is going to make their name great and they�re going to be a blessing to everyone.

Verse 13. �So they ruthlessly made the people of Israel work as slaves and made their lives bitter with hard service in mortar and brick and all kinds of work in the field. In all their work, the word is used again here, ruthlessly, they made them work as slaves.

Then King of Egypt said to the Hebrew midwives, by the way, without looking at it, what are their names? Anybody remember? You�re failing my class here because I was going to try to tell you what was Pharaoh�s name.

Nobody knows Pharaoh�s name. What were the two Hebrew midwives names? We all know them. Well, we all do now. Shipra and Pua. Take a look. And one was named Shipra and the other was named Pua. One was named Beauty and one was named Splendor.

I don�t know about Pua as a name for Splendor, but it�s a different culture. Gomer, Pua, you know what I�m talking about. It�s interesting. We don�t know who the Pharaohs are, but these two names inscribed forever as two ladies who would do the right thing, taking God�s promise at face value, at their own expense, possibly.

Verse 16, when you serve as a midwife to the Hebrew women and see them give birth on the birth stool, they kind of had this stone thing that they would make and women would hunch down as they would give birth.

If it�s a son, kill him. If it�s a daughter, she shall live. Why kill the sons and not the daughters? Well, the daughters would just marry into the Egyptian race and be assimilated and we wouldn�t know the difference.

But the midwives, verse 17, feared God and did not do as the king of Egypt commanded them, but let the male children live. I mean, this is a classic illustration of Acts chapter 5, is it not? Do you know what?

We�ll obey you in every way, shape and form, but when you tell me to sin, I won�t do it, right? So the king of Egypt called the midwives and said to them, �Why have you done this and let the male children live?

Because the Hebrew women are not like the Egyptian women, for they�re so vigorous, they give birth before the midwife comes to them. So God dealt well with the midwives. How did he deal well with them?

The people multiplied and grew very strong and because the midwives feared God, he gave them families. It probably was true that you�re a midwife because you�re barren, you can�t have children and then now because of their fearing God, trusting God, he gives them children.

Verse 22, �Then Pharaoh commanded all his people, �Every son that is born of the Hebrews shall be cast in the Nile, but you shall let every daughter live. Well, now we come to really what Hebrews chapter 11 is talking about, the birth of Moses, Exodus chapter 2.

Now a man from the house of Levi went and took as his wife a Levite woman. The woman conceived and bore a son and when she saw he was a fine child, or as Hebrews says, a beautiful child, she hid him for three months.

When she could no longer hide him, she took for him a basket made of bulrushes, or literally an ark, where we would get the word ark, Noah�s ark, daubed it with bitumen and pitch, she put the child in it and placed it among the reeds by the river bank.

Now we have no idea if she had any inkling on Moses being the future deliverer. Josephus said that in a dream the parents were told, �He�s going to be this great deliverer, protect him at all cost. Argus text says in Hebrews that he was beautiful, that he was fine looking.

Sometimes people back in those days would say, �Well, they�re so beautiful, God must have a purpose for them, they�re so handsome, God�s going to use them. I don�t really know if any of that�s true or not.

What I do know is they�re not going to kill the boy. People say, �Well, why three months, because the kids start�I�m serious, talking to me. Do you know if you ever say the word Assyrian, Siri answers you.

Well, at three months, isn�t the baby going to be kind of loud and they have to get rid of the boy at three months? Have you ever heard a two-month-old cry? They�re loud, and by the way, what�s the difference between a boy crying and a girl crying?

Most likely what�s happening is she�s going to have three months off of her work, the mom, now three months is up, somebody�s going to have to watch that kid, and when you take the diaper off, guess what you�re going to see?

Not a girl. So at three months, something�s going to happen. So verse four, �The sister stood at a distance to know what would be done to him. Now the daughter of Pharaoh came down to bathe at the river while her young women walked beside the river.

She saw the basket among the reeds, sent her servant, she took it. She opened it up, saw the child, and behold, the baby was crying. She took pity on him. I mean, the providence of God, the sovereignty of God.

This is one of the Hebrews� children. Obviously, they could see. �Then his sister said to Pharaoh�s daughter, �Shall I go and carry you a nurse from the Hebrew women to nurse the child for you And here with luck, serendipity, fate, and chance, it says in verse eight, �Pharaoh�s daughter said to her, �Go ahead.

So the girl called the child, �Mother, take this child away and nurse him for me, and I will give you wages. You nurse your own child and also we�ll pay you for it. That�s a pretty good deal. That sounds like later you�re going to leave Egypt with all their money.

That happened too. �The child grew. She brought him to Pharaoh�s daughter. He became her son. She named him Moses because I drew him out of the water. And that�s what Moses means. So the writer in Hebrews is saying Moses� parents had faith, trusting in this God to do the right thing, even though they might lose their own lives to protect the son.

Hebrews says both husband and wife were involved in protecting their son. I think Moses� parents knew the Abrahamic covenant. Genesis chapter 15, �The Lord said to Abram, �Know for certain that your offspring will be sojourners in a land that is not theirs, and there will be servants there.

They�ll be afflicted for 400 years, but I will bring judgment on the nation that they serve, and afterwards they shall come out with great possessions. We know that we�re only here for a while and God will take it out because He�s promised to Abraham our father.

We know that Genesis 3 talks about a Messiah to come out of the covenant of Abraham. We know, we trust. Event number two, let�s go back to Hebrews chapter 12. Something now about Moses himself. I think he learned from his faithful parents.

I think he learned from his parents that feared the Lord. The writer of Hebrews is just trying to show you that many other people who were less than faithful all their lives, who were sinful and not the Messiah, they had faith in the Messiah.

You keep having faith in the Messiah. And whether it�s a health issue, whether it�s a family issue, whether it�s a plague across the nation, across the world, you can trust the Lord. You can take Him at His word and your faith has to be forward looking.

There�s a future. Everything on this earth, there�s something past this earth. Hebrews chapter 11, verses 24 -26, the second event in Moses� life, designed for you to keep believing, taking God at His word.

Moses Chooses the Reproach of Christ

Verse 24 -26, �By faith Moses, when he was grown up, refused to be called the son of Pharaoh�s daughter, choosing rather to be mistreated with the people of God than to enjoy the fleeting pleasures of sin.

He considered the reproach of Christ greater wealth than the treasures of Egypt, for he was looking to the reward. Can you imagine the privileges and some of the things that go along with being Pharaoh�s son, Pharaoh�s daughter�s son, to be more precise?

So much that he could have. And you know what? If I was Moses, maybe I�d be thinking, let�s see, I could put one foot in this world, and I could put one foot in this world, and by the way, influence is good, and so how can I stay in Egypt and be a good influence for the Israel people?

I can see all this going through Moses� mind. But he made the choice, and he stuck to it. Moses had no inkling to be some political Messiah. He didn�t care about revolution. He didn�t care about politics.

He cared about one thing. I will be identified with God�s people even if it costs me. That�s the point here. I will be identified with God�s people even if it costs me. Think about the writer of Hebrews and its recipients.

I�ll be identified with God�s people even if it what? Costs me. That�s the point. His parents taught him well. It had nothing to do with blood. It had nothing to do with Zionism. It had to do with these are the people that God has chosen.

Spurgeon said, �Moses believed that the Israelites were the chosen people of God. This, of course, he had learned from his parents, and he heartily believed it. �Though it certainly did not look to be true, it was the solemn conviction of Moses that the living and true God had chosen the seed of Abraham to be his people.

They were the election of grace. For this cause, Moses loved them and desired to be numbered with them. Of course, the recipients of the book of Hebrews now would be saying things like, �Yes, we�ve thrown in our lot with God and his people, and if we suffer, we suffer.

We�ve made our choice. Those who live by faith identify with God�s people even if they suffer. Sounds kind of like Jesus to me, does it not? Did, in fact, Jesus identify with us? It�s the opposite of, �We identify with God�s people.

Even the Lord Jesus identified with us, Hebrews 9, �Since therefore the children share in flesh and blood, he himself likewise partook of the same things that through death he might destroy the one who has the power of death, that is, the devil.

Look at verse 26 in your Bible in Hebrews 11, �He considered the reproach of Christ greater wealth than the treasures of Egypt, and he was looking to the reward. I mean, the temporary advantage of Egypt with all the pomp and circumstance and glory, that was something to give up.

How alluring! The world had everything to offer through the treasures of Egypt, but Moses reckoned, he thought, he counted, he made a calculation, �That�s not worth it. I�m going to add up everything, and I�d rather pay the price.

I�m going to look forward. And he identifies, the text says, with the reproach of Christ. He considered the reproach of Christ. How can we talk about Christ in the Old Testament? How can we talk about Christ in Exodus?

True or false? Moses was a prophet. All right. You thought it was a trick question, didn�t you? True or false? David was a prophet. That is a trick question. You�re going to have to look that up on Siri.

There was a greater prophet who was going to come, greater than Moses, that Moses wrote about in Deuteronomy chapter 18. I don�t think we look at the Old Testament like we should sometimes. I think we look at it, Jesus comes later.

They�re thinking about this Messiah who is going to come since Genesis chapter 3. I love Deuteronomy 18, �The Lord your God will raise up for you a prophet like me Moses is talking, �from among you, from your brothers.

It is to him you shall listen, just as you desired the Lord your God at Horeb on the day of assembly. Moses didn�t say, �I�m going to go for revolution, but I�m a man of faith, and I�m trusting in this Messiah, the Lord Jesus who would come.

He didn�t know his name was Jesus, but he knew the Messiah would come. He didn�t straddle the fence, no halfway position. He regarded the disgrace that he was going through for the sake of Christ. He knew the Messiah would come.

He didn�t know when, but it was going to be worth it. And I could play this off on Hebrews for the audience. The Lord Jesus is going to come back the second time. We don�t know when, but it�s going to be worth it.

Moses Leaves Egypt by Faith

Event number 3, designed for you to keep believing, for you to have faith in the object of the high priest, in spite of circumstances with forward-looking nature. Event number 3, verse 27, �By faith Hebrews 11, �he left Egypt, not being afraid of the anger of the king, for he endured as seeing him who is invisible.

So we�ve got the parents, we�ve got the reproaches of Christ, and now we�ve got �he left Egypt. How many times did Moses leave Egypt? Not according to the cartoon or the Ten Commandments, but the Bible.

Twice. Once he leaves for Midian, and later, 40 years later, he leaves for Exodus. So which one is which? Which one is this? �By faith, he left Egypt, not being afraid. Which one is it? 50 -50? Sometimes when I look out of the congregation and you look a little tired, then I have to like walk back and forth or hit the PowerPoint.

I�m trying to figure out a way to kind of get your attention right now. Huh? Taser. I learned not that long I mean Luke is in Indiana preaching this weekend at a conference. I learned not that long ago that when he was in college in the dorm room, they would have a couple tasers and they�d run into a buddy�s room and then double tase him.

And I�m like, �What kind of kid is that I asked my wife, �What kind of son did you raise See, now you�re paying attention. Creating me a clean heart, �Oh God, it should be Luke�s prayer. The first time when Moses left, he left because he was afraid.

So while this is taken out of chronological order, which is fine for them to do, this is the second time. This is �Moses leaves the second time, 40 years later. This is the Exodus. John Owen has this view.

John Calvin has this view. Arthur Pink has this view. It�s kind of difficult because do we take it chronologically? But I think that whole fear thing comes into play. Either way, the point is this. Moses took God at his word and obeyed anyway.

He walked by faith and not by sight. And then number four, the fourth event, verse 28, �By faith he kept the Passover and sprinkled the blood so that the destroyer of the firstborn might not touch them.

Okay, I�ve been waiting my whole sermon to lead up to this. This is the Passover. Take your Bibles and turn to the Passover chapter in Exodus. Does anybody know where that is? Exodus chapter 12. There should be certain things in your mind where you should say, �Genesis 3, the Messiah is promised.

You should have things in your mind like Genesis 12, 15, 17, 21, Abrahamic covenant. You should have things in your mind like Exodus 3, the burning bush, Exodus chapter 12, Passover, Leviticus 16, Yom Kippur.

This is one that you should mark. If you�ve got a Bible, maybe you put a crease on it or a special notation digitally. This is the Passover event. And now let�s think about it before I read the passage and we go through it.

You have to take God at His word to survive, but it�s weird. It�s not scientific. It doesn�t even really seem logical. There�s no precedent for it. You daub some blood over the door post and you live.

Well, what do you mean? This is just as odd as next week. I want you to march around the city six times and on the seventh time, march around seven times and the walls will come tumbling down. What are these things?

How does this go about? So the author wants you to know. You have revelation from God. He says something. You see it in the word. They heard it from God directly and we�ll do it no matter what in spite of what we see.

We have to walk by faith. The whole thing is walking by faith, not by science, logic or something else. There�s a supernatural nature to God. Don�t buy into modernism where we just gut any kind of supernatural thing.

This is the sprinkling of the blood by faith. Moses thought, �I�m going to take God at His word even if it kills me. Even if I perish, I perish. So knowing that, take a look at Exodus chapter 12. We�re not going to look at every verse, but of course every reader of the book of Hebrews would immediately think, �Yes, that�s true.

This is a forward-looking faith, taking God at His word kind of faith, faith in the object of God, the triune God Himself faith, not just kind of this amorphous faith in faith, taking some kind of Kierkegaardian leap of faith.

No. I know who God is. He�s trustworthy and if He was faithful then and I know He doesn�t change, He�s faithful now. And before I read this, I could just make it as practical as possible. Dear Christian, no matter what you�re going through, you can trust God.

His word is true. Your life could be chaos, but His word is true. And you have to reorient your mind, it�s called repentance, to think that way. I have a dear friend and he�s going through a trial and I talked to him on the phone yesterday and he�s been handling the trial pretty well.