Sovereign Grace Baptist Church

Free Grace Media

Of Princeton, New Jersey

 

AuthorClay Curtis
TitleWorship as God Commands
Bible TextExodus 8:25-28
Synopsis Christ separates his people from this world and makes us come to God through faith in him alone worshipping as God command us.
Date05-Nov-2017
Series Exodus 2016
Article Type Sermon Notes
PDF Format pdf
Word Format doc
Audio HI-FI Listen: Worship as God Commands (32 kbps)
Audio CD Quality Listen: Worship as God Commands (128 kbps)
Length 45 min.
 

Series: Exodus

Title: Worship as God Commands Us

Text: Exodus 8: 25-28

Date: November 5, 2017

Place: SGBC, New Jersey

 

Exodus 8: 25: And Pharaoh called for Moses and for Aaron, and said, Go ye, sacrifice to your God in the land. 26: And Moses said, It is not meet so to do; for we shall sacrifice the abomination of the Egyptians to the LORD our God: lo, shall we sacrifice the abomination of the Egyptians before their eyes, and will they not stone us? 27: We will go three days’ journey into the wilderness, and sacrifice to the LORD our God, as he shall command us. 28: And Pharaoh said, I will let you go, that ye may sacrifice to the LORD your God in the wilderness; only ye shall not go very far away: intreat for me.

 

God uses this warfare between Pharaoh and the Egyptians verses Moses and the children of Israel to picture our spiritual warfare. Pharaoh—typifies Satan under whose power God’s people are born into this world. The Egyptians and their idolatry—typifies unregenerate religious men. Moses and Aaron and the children of Israel—typify Christ and his preachers and his people.

 

Satan is the strong man who refuses to let God’s people go. Satan uses all his craftiness and strength to keep his people under his power in deception. But Christ is the one stronger than he.

 

Luke 11: 21: When a strong man armed keepeth his palace, his goods are in peace: 22: But when a stronger than he shall come upon him, and overcome him, he taketh from him all his armour wherein he trusted, and divideth his spoils.

 

Proposition: Christ separates his people from this world and makes us come to God through faith in him alone worshipping as God command us.

 

SATAN’S DEVICES

 

Exodus 8: 25: And Pharaoh called for Moses and for Aaron, and said, Go ye, sacrifice to your God in the land....28: And Pharaoh said, I will let you go, that ye may sacrifice to the LORD your God in the wilderness; only ye shall not go very far away

 

Satan has many ways of deceiving sinners. One is obvious hatred of God—first Pharaoh violently opposed Moses. Two is imitation—Pharaoh’s magicians imitated God’s messengers. Our text shows us a third device: compromise.

 

2. If Pharaoh let them worship God while in Egypt he could keep them in bondage…if he lengthened the chain and let them go but not very far away—a lengthened chain is still a chain.

 

Satan loves for the sinner to become religious so long as he is not separated  from the bondage of his flesh and this ungodly world so that he tries to worship God while continuing in the enjoyment of sin or from the bondage of false works religion so that he mingles grace and works

 

Brethren, the religious world around us built on compromise. They try to pressure all men to compromise. But we cannot compromise! I have seen newly converted believers think they can have a positive influence over their friends if they compromise and go with them to hear a false gospel. How much influence would a mother have turning her daughter from prostitution by standing on the corner turning tricks with her? The same is true of a believer who compromises and attempts to worship among will-works religion. Hear God:

 

2 Corinthians 6: 14: Be ye not unequally yoked together with unbelievers: for what fellowship hath righteousness with unrighteousness? and what communion hath light with darkness? 15: And what concord hath Christ with Belial? or what part hath he that believeth with an infidel? 16: And what agreement hath the temple of God with idols? for ye are the temple of the living God; as God hath said, I will dwell in them, and walk in them; and I will be their God, and they shall be my people. 17: Wherefore come out from among them, and be ye separate, saith the Lord, and touch not the unclean thing; and I will receive you, 18: And will be a Father unto you, and ye shall be my sons and daughters, saith the Lord Almighty.

 

God help us to say with Paul “The world is crucified unto me, and I unto the world.”

 

THEY WILL STONE US

 

Exodus 8: 26: And Moses said, It is not meet so to do; for we shall sacrifice the abomination of the Egyptians to the LORD our God: lo, shall we sacrifice the abomination of the Egyptians before their eyes, and will they not stone us?

 

In Genesis 46:34 we are told that “every shepherd is an abomination unto the Egyptians.” Therefore, to offer a lamb in sacrifice to God would be equally abominable to them.

 

The Sacrifice required, if we are to worship God “in spirit and in truth” is Christ our Lord, the Lamb of God; and Christ crucified is an abomination to the world. “The preaching of the cross is to them that perish foolishness.

 

Self-willed religionists hate the Lord Jesus who said, “You did not choose me, I chose you.”

 

Self-exalting religionists who think they deserve to be saved hate the Lord Jesus who said “I lay down my life for the sheep.”

 

Self-justifying men hate the Christ who by himself purged the sins of his people and was raised again for our justification, apart from any work done by us.

 

Self-sanctifying men hate the Christ who Sanctifies and is our Sanctification, apart from man’s works.

 

Self-working men who boast in their good works hate the God who gets all the glory for working in us both to will and do of his good pleasure.

 

Self-keeping men hate the God who keeps his people by his power through faith in Christ.

 

Christ is an abomination to will-workers because Christ takes all the work out of the sinners hand and declares all man’s best self-righteous works sin! Christ said,

 

John 15:22: If I had not come and spoken unto them, they had not had sin: but now they have no cloke for their sin.

 

Therefore, any believer who attempts to declare Christ in truth amongst will-works religion shall be rejected even as

 Christ—“and will they not stone us?”

 

John 15: [The Lord Jesus says] 19: If ye were of the world, the world would love his own; but because ye are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hateth you. 20: Remember the word that I said unto you, The servant is not greater than his lord. If they have persecuted me, they will also persecute you; if they have kept my saying, they will keep yours also.

 

TRUE WORSHIP

 

Exodus 8: 27: We will go three days’ journey into the wilderness, and sacrifice to the LORD our God, as he shall command us.

 

 “We will go three days’ journey into the wilderness”—true worship is to be saved from our sin out of this ungodly world—by Christ. On the third day, Christ arose from the grave to newness of life, separating his people in him. On the third day, Christ was raised for our justification—declaring that he justified his people from all things from which you could not be justified by the law of Moses or your works. Christ saved his people from our sins, from the curse of the law by his precious blood as of a Lamb without spot or blemish. The will of God is to save his people from this present evil world.

 

Galatians 1: 3: Grace unto you, and peace from God the Father, and our Lord Jesus Christ, who gave himself for our sins, that he might deliver us from this present evil world, according to the will of God and our Father: to whom be glory for ever and ever. Amen.

 

In addition to raising us with Christ, in regeneration, God resurrects his child to newness of life. God delivers his child from the power of darkness and translates us into the kingdom of his dear Son. He sanctifies us from this world to newness of life when he resurrects us in the new birth.

 

Redemption and separation from Egypt were one and the same thing. God said, "I am come down to deliver them," but a redemption which would have left them in Egypt, could not possibly be God's salvation. In fact, the children of Israel never sacrificed a single note of praise to God until redemption was fully accomplished through the blood of the Passover Lamb and they were sanctified by God to the other side of the Red Sea.  A sinner never worships God in spirit and in truth until Christ has accomplished our redemption as well as resurrecting us to newness of life to faith in him in regeneration.

 

Then worshipping God in newness of life, newness of spirit is going three days journey into the wilderness—leaving this Egyptian world and its idolatry, repenting from all our former works, worshipping God in spirit and in truth, which is all the fruit of Christ works in us by resurrecting us from the dead.

 

Romans 7: 4  Wherefore, my brethren, ye also are become dead to the law by the body of Christ; [by his death our old man of sin died in him] that ye should be married to another, even to him who is raised from the dead, that we should bring forth fruit unto God. [by Christ’s resurrection and by him resurrecting us in regeneration we are alive spiritually and bring forth fruit by Christ our Husband]  5: For when we were in the flesh, the motions of sins, which were by the law, did work in our members to bring forth fruit unto death. 6: But now we are delivered from the law, that being dead wherein we were held; that we should serve in newness of spirit, and not in the oldness of the letter.

 

By going three days’ journey into the wilderness—worshipping with God’s people under his gospel we confess before this world that we are dead to the world and alive with Christ; we are partakers of His rejection by this world and partakers of His acceptance in heaven and the joy of the latter makes us count the former as nothing. By God giving us a new heart and separating his people from this self-righteous religious world, believers bear witness to Christ which we could never bear while connected with it.

 

True worship is to “sacrifice to the LORD our God, as he shall command us.” Sinners only truly worship God when the Spirit of God speaks effectually into our hearts commanding we cease from our vain way and worship as he commands us.  God commands his child that the one and only sacrifice in whom he will accept us is Christ Jesus his darling Son.

 

Acts 4: 12: Neither is there salvation in any other: for there is none other name under heaven given among men, whereby we must be saved.

 

Ephesians 5:2…[Christ alone] hath loved us, and hath given himself for us an offering and a sacrifice to God for a sweetsmelling savour.

 

Hebrews 9: 25: Nor yet that he should offer himself often, as the high priest entereth into the holy place every year with blood of others; 26  For then must he often have suffered since the foundation of the world: but now once in the end of the world hath he appeared to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself.

 

Hebrews 10: 12: But this man, after he had offered one sacrifice for sins for ever, sat down on the right hand of God; 13  From henceforth expecting till his enemies be made his footstool. 14: For by one offering he hath perfected for ever them that are sanctified. [whereof the Holy Ghost bears witness in the heart he regenerates saying]…17: And their sins and iniquities will I remember no more. 18: Now where remission of these is, there is no more offering for sin.

 

DO AS MOSES DID

 

Do not give heed to the many different strange doctrines of men—Hebrews 13: 9  Be not carried about with divers and strange doctrines. For it is a good thing that the heart be established with grace; not with meats, which have not profited them that have been occupied therein.

 

Never compromise with this ungodly religious world but be ye separate saith the LORD your God—Hebrews 13: 10: We have an altar, whereof they have no right to eat which serve the tabernacle. 11: For the bodies of those beasts, whose blood is brought into the sanctuary by the high priest for sin, are burned without the camp. 12: Wherefore Jesus also, that he might sanctify the people with his own blood, suffered without the gate. 13: Let us go forth therefore unto him without the camp, bearing his reproach. 14  For here have we no continuing city, but we seek one to come. Satan would rejoice, at any time, by any means, under any circumstances, to get even the semblance of divine sanction for the world's religion. And if a true child of God attempts to worship among will-workers he gives credit to the religion of the day.

 

Do as Moses and offer to God come out and offer to God the one sacrifice with which God is pleased—his SonHebrews 13: 15: By him therefore let us offer the sacrifice of praise to God continually, that is, the fruit of our lips giving thanks to his name.

 

Amen!