Grace Community Trenton
Pastor Hutch Garmany and Cody Kennamer at Grace Community Trenton in Trenton, Ga.
Grace Community Trenton
Leaving Egypt: The Mystery of The Cross
Use Left/Right to seek, Home/End to jump to start or end. Hold shift to jump forward or backward.
Exodus 34: 1 - 10
Do you now stand for the reading of God's Word? Our passage this morning is Exodus chapter 34, beginning of verse 1. Exodus chapter 34, verse 1, page 80, in your red pew Bibles.
SPEAKER_00The Lord said to Moses, Chisel out two stone tablets like the first ones, and I will write on them the words that were on the first tablets, which you broke. Be ready in the morning, then come up on Mount Sinai. Present yourself to me there on top of the mountain. No one is to come with you or be seen anywhere on the mountain, not even the flocks and herds may graze in front of the mountain. So Moses chiseled out two stone tablets like the first ones and went up Mount Sinai early in the morning, as the Lord had commanded him. He carried the two stone tablets in his hand. Then the Lord came down in a cloud and stood there with him and proclaimed his name, the Lord. And he passed in front of the mountain, proclaiming, The Lord, the Lord, the compassionate and gracious God, slow to anger, abounding in love and faithfulness, maintaining love to thousands, and forgiving wickedness, rebellion, and sin. Yet he does not leave the guilty unpunished. He punishes the children and their children's children for the sins of the parents to the third and fourth generation. Moses bowed to the ground at once and worshiped. Lord, he said, If I have found favor in your eyes, then let the Lord go with us. Although this is a stiff-necked people, forgive your wicked our wickedness and our sin, and take us as your inheritance. Then the Lord said, I'm making a covenant with you before all your people. I will do wonders never before done in any nation in all the world. The people you live among will see how awesome is the work that I, the Lord, will do for you. This is the word of the Lord.
SPEAKER_04Thanks be to God. Thank you, Caea and David. We want to acknowledge his role. Would you now join me in prayer as we come to God's word? Let's pray together. Father, this morning we have come and we have brought you our offerings in worship. Lord, we have offered you our praises. Lord, we have uh offered our hearts in prayer to you. We have heard your word read to us, and Lord, we pray that now as we come to the preaching of your word, that by your Spirit you would take this very ordinary and weak offering from a mere man, and that you would speak, that you would take your word and that you would penetrate our hearts with it. In Christ's name we pray. Amen. So, a question to get us started, this is for our young people and for others as well. Have you ever known so much about someone that you've never met? Have you ever known so much about someone that you felt like you knew them? You ever had that experience, like maybe it's a favorite artist, it's a favorite uh musician or an athlete, big thing in our culture. You know, we all have these celebrities. We we're in a celebrity culture, and we all have these celebrities that we just are enamored with, we see their gifts, and and we we almost have an insatiable desire to learn about them. And of course, celebrities know this very well, and so they they use social media and all of these different uh strategies and tactics to kind of reveal things about themselves. And and it it really can feel like I know them. I I I've I watch what they do, I know their songs by heart, I watch the documentaries and and I follow them on Twitter, and and you can almost begin to feel like I I really know them. But in fact, you've never actually met them. There's a big difference between knowing about and knowing in a very personal way. Now, this is very important to understand, especially in the Bible belt. We find ourselves in a culture that has churches on every corner, we are surrounded by Christianity. Flannery O'Connor called the South a Christ-haunted place. It's that it's it just tends to be everywhere around us, and so it's very easy to have this sense that, like, I know about God, I go to church, I know the right things, I have good theology, I'm I'm a good person. We can think that because we know about God that we know him, when in fact maybe we don't. And even for those of us that do know him, for those of us who have come into a saving relationship with Jesus, too often we are willing to uh to let knowing about him take the place of seeking to grow in our knowledge of him, our heart knowledge of him, our relationship with him. Sometimes that's a great temptation. So here's what we're gonna see in our passage this morning. God reveals to us the fullness of his glory through the cross of Jesus Christ. That's where we encounter the fullness of his glory, is in the cross of Jesus. So we jump into this passage here, uh, Exodus 34. We've been working through the book of Exodus. If you remember last week we saw that scene where Moses has interceded for God's people, and he is before God, and he says to God, show me your glory. Now that for Moses is not just some request for a cool experience. He's not saying, God, I want to see what you look like. He's not trying to satisfy some curiosity, like, I wonder what God looks like here. He's not just looking for a mere experience. What he is seeking is to know God more deeply. God, show me your glory so that I know you more, so that I worship you more deeply. This is what the Bible calls seeking God's face. Right? Many, we see that in many places in the Psalms where the psalmist will say, you know, God, we I'm seeking your face. Seek his face, not just his hand. Sometimes as in the Christian life, we can seek God's hand, we can want God to do things for us. God, show up, God, fix this thing in my life, God help me in this way. And those are all good and appropriate, but so often for us, we would prefer that God do something for us, like namely fix my circumstances, than ultimately, God, I want to know you. I want to see your face. I want to see your glory. And so, Moses, for us, we see the boldness of Moses in saying, God, I want you. Let me see who you are. Let me see your glory and behold you that I may enjoy you. And that's what we saw last week. So as we come to this passage, we are seeing that encounter. So what he has requested is actually at the deepest places of God's heart, is God's longing to be seen, to reveal himself, to be known. So when when someone prays, God, show me your glory, we're actually praying according to the deepest parts of God's will. And so God says, I will do this very thing. And there's a place where you may stand on a mountain, and I will pass by, I will come down, my my glory will pass by you, and there's a cleft in the rock that I will hide you in that place and protect you from the full reality of my glory, because you can't handle it, Moses. But I'm going to show you as much as I can about who I am. And that's the scene that we come to this morning, the actual encounter. Now, one thing to notice right off the bat is that what's happening in this scene is a covenant renewal. If you remember, if you've been with us as we've been walking through, is uh in chapter 19, whenever Moses goes up on Mount Sinai to represent the people and they enter into a covenant with God. It's like it's like Israel's wedding day, where they enter into that covenant relationship with God and he gives the law and the two stone tablets. But if you've been following the story, you know that right when on the very wedding day, Israel runs after other gods. It was the golden calf affair. You remember that one? Moses is on the mountain with God, they're sealing this covenant, and Israel is down the mountain worshiping a false God. It was at the very heart of the Ten Commandments, which will have no other God before me. And Moses, when he comes down in that scene, he breaks the tablets. And it looks like in that moment, all is lost. Israel has broken the covenant almost before it got started. And this thing's over. But then you see the intercession of Moses, where he puts himself in the place of Israel. And here God is renewing the covenant. That's what's happening in this scenario here. So Moses is called to come up on the mountain to meet again with God. He's to bring the two stone tablets, and he goes up to meet with God. And then we're told in verse 5 that God comes down in the cloud. So often in the Old Testament, God manifests his presence through a cloud or through fire. God comes down in his presence in the cloud. He stands there before him. And this is very mysterious, this description. Because it is God's presence, but yet it is also the declaration of who God is. It's God's word. One of the things we see here, because when God's presence passes by, it is actually his word passing by, speaking of who he is. It's almost like the limits of language are here. It's almost like Moses is unable to fully describe what this was. But the thing to see that God's presence is manifested in his word, the declaration of who he is. And so God comes and his presence passes by and he proclaims his name. He proclaims his attributes, who he is. And you see, that is his glory. Moses has said, Show me your glory. God's glory is not primarily something that we see with our eyes, but something that we know with our heart. God's glory is the radiance of who he is. God's glory is the value of his person, his attributes, his characteristics, the wonders of who he is in his heart. And so when God passes by, the revealing of his glory is actually the declaration of who he is. And then you get this description here in verse 6 that really, if you are a student of the Psalms, you will see that the psalmists are always using this language to talk about God. This is God revealing who he is. Now, two things I want us to notice here that we learn about these attributes that he declares in front of Moses. First, and primarily we see in this list, it reveals that God is gracious. Look again at what it says. Verse 6. He passes by, he proclaims the Lord the Lord. Now remember, in your English Bible, when you see Lord and the L is capitalized in the ESV, they're all capitalized. It is translating the Hebrew word Yahweh is I am. It is the personal covenant name that God gave to Moses at the beginning of the book of Exodus. So it is Yahweh, Yahweh, the compassionate and gracious God, slow to anger, abounding. Abounding, that means like overflowing, okay? Abounding in love and faithfulness. Now, what's translated in the English here as love, abounding in love, is actually the Old Testament word hesed or chesed. All right, you got hock something there. Hesed, right? And hesed is God's covenant love. It's like loyalty. I mean, the best way to understand it is to think of husband and wife. Think of this loyalty that a loving spouse would have for their other, that, that, that it is a committed love. It is bound. It is, I am loyal to you above all other things. I am for you. I'm never going to leave you or forsake you. That is chesed, right? It's God's covenant, committed love to his people. Come what may, I'm not going anywhere, kind of love. And we're told here in God's proclamation, he abounds in this. It's who he is. That he is gracious. He's full of grace. You know, grace, this massive biblical concept, and it is only found in the Bible. You know, grace is different than even as wonderful as mercy is. You know, mercy is like not getting what you deserve. That's wonderful. But grace, it's so much more extravagant. It's getting the opposite of what you deserve. It's deserving condemnation, deserving judgment, and yet getting favor and love and delight. It's an unbelievable reality. It is only found in the heart and person of God. He's compassionate. God sees misery and he is moved to strange excesses. When he sees our brokenness, when he sees our weakness, when when he sees human misery, God is moved at the very core of who he is. Why? Because it is who he is. It's his attribute. That he is a God who forgives. He forgives, uh, verse 7 forgives wickedness, rebellion, and sin. This is who God is. He is a God who forgives wickedness. Amazing. We could take any one of these attributes and just be like, let's just sit on this for a couple hours, right? What would happen in you if you really believed that that's who God is? You know, I think very often we can get that in our heads. Yeah, yeah, I can get that right on a test. I believe that. But how hard it is for the truth of who God is and the depths of his grace to really penetrate our hearts. What if it would just really be true? What if he was like this for you in spite of all your brokenness? And so many of us are living out of the lies that we have come to believe about who God is and how he feels towards us. And so it's it is truth that breaks the power of lies. This is who God is. So God is a God of grace, love, mercy, abounding. You know, that version of God is not one that is likely to cause a lot of stir in our culture. Actually, in our American culture, the idea that God is gracious and loving, though I think very few actually believe that, the idea that God is loving and gracious is actually a positive thing. We are likely to see this celebrated on Facebook and by our celebrities whenever they claim God all the time, you know. God is a God of love, He's a God of acceptance. That's true. The reason that I think that that appeals so much in our culture is because we live in a therapeutic culture. And it's easy when we read that about God, that what that means is that God is like our therapist. Right? You know how a, and I'm not anti-therapy at all, don't hear me wrong. But you know, what does a therapist do? A therapist is someone who you go and you share your your your weight and your troubles with and everything, and what they do is they listen and they encourage you, as they should. But a therapist is not there to confront you. Maybe some do, maybe real good ones do, but they don't they don't tell you you're wrong, right? They don't call you out. That's why our culture just loves therapy. But did you notice there's something else God reveals about Himself? I mean, with this incredible picture of His grace, but then in the second part of verse 7, it says this, second sentence, yet He does not leave the guilty unpunished. He punishes the children and their children for the sin of the parents to the third and fourth generation. He punishes sin. It's who God is. It's because he is righteous. You know, righteousness and justice are near synonyms. He's a God of justice. He is a God who must punish the guilt of sin. He must. It's at the core of who he is. And and really deep down, we want God to be this way. We just don't want him to be that way towards us, right? But as we look out at the brokenness of the world, we want justice. Right? A friend of mine recently, one of his children went through a really hard um uh court case where they had been wronged, and and the outcome of the case just felt like it fell so far short of justice for his child. And and I was talking with him, and just the pain in his voice, the pain that that she did not get justice for the ways in which she was wronged. And it's just like that's the most natural thing in the world. We all intuitively know that there must be justice. See, this is at the heart of who God is. He is a God of justice, of righteousness, and he must punish sin. That's good news. Now, we got a problem here, right? Now, wait a minute. So God's revealed himself. He said, Who I here's who I am. I am a God of mercy, and I am a God of justice. How does that go? I'm a God who is gracious, I am a God who loves to forgive wickedness. It's at the core of who I am. Yet I will not let the guilty go unpunished. How does that fit together? Right? So often as we think about God or or we we construct our images of God, we want to take one and not the other, right? This is what our culture does all the time. Well, I like the God who's loving but not just. Or I like the God who's just, but I'm not into the loving because I want everybody to do it right, right? We're always wanting to take one side of God and say, this is really what God's like, but that's not what Scripture does. That's not how God reveals Himself. He says, I am a God of grace and I am a God of justice. How do those get reconciled? And you see this tension throughout the Old Covenant, throughout the Old Testament, you see this tension. You see it right here with Israel. How's he gonna do this? How's he gonna be a covenant God who's loyal to his people and yet his people continually break the covenant? How? You see, the ultimate problem is the problem that he has. How can he be both just and the justifier? And the answer is this only in the cross. Only in the cross. You know, the the apostle Paul calls the cross the mystery of God, the mystery kept hidden for ages and generations. This this mystery of like, how is this gonna come together? How is God gonna make good on his promises to redeem his people whenever his people are bent on rebellion? How are they gonna be his people? How is he gonna live in their midst? How is this gonna To work out because as you follow the Ark of the Old Testament, you see the failure of Israel over and over and over because they are programmed to sin. Sometimes we think of sin as like a mistake, right? Or we think of some big sin in our life and we think, I don't know what happened, that wasn't me. Here's the reality: it is you. It just popped out, right? How will these come together? And Paul says, that is the mystery of the gospel, kept hidden for ages, but now revealed to us in Jesus. You see, the cross is the ultimate revelation of the glory of God. The Apostle Paul says this in Romans 3. This is one of the finest descriptions of the gospel and all of Scripture. But he introduces it in verse 21 by saying this, but now. Now before this, he has talked about how all, all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. All are bent on wickedness and rebellion in the depths of our hearts. That's how the Bible describes us, believe it or not. In all of our niceness, yes, it is actually true. Put me in the right situation and you will see it, I promise. But now, here's the good news. In the gospel, apart from the law, the righteousness of God has been made known. Paul's description of the gospel and the cross of Jesus is that it is God's revealing of his righteousness. It is God revealing of his glory, how he is both merciful and gracious and just and righteous at the same time. And here's his description that God presented Christ as a sacrifice of atonement. Remember, we've seen that throughout the old covenant. Atonement is this washing through the shedding of blood. It's the taking the place of Jesus on the cross, taking our place. Because in his forbearance he had left the sins committed beforehand unpunished. And he did it to demonstrate his righteousness as of the present time, so as to be just and the one who justifies those who have faith in Jesus. You see that. What does that mean to be a justifier? It means to declare you righteous when you are not.
unknownRight?
SPEAKER_04It only comes together in the cross of Jesus. You want to know who God is more than anything else? Look at the cross. You want to know what his heart is like? Look at the cross. You want to know what his love is like? Look at the cross. His love is not a love based on what you do, which is what love in the world is. We love things that are lovely, right? But what is God's love like? Look at the cross. It is a self-dying love. It is God saying, I will take your punishment upon myself. That's what love looks like.
unknownRight?
SPEAKER_04You want to see the power of God? Look at the cross. This is what Martin Luther called the theology of the cross. He contrasted it with the theology of glory. The theology of glory is this understanding of God kind of in human terms, that God's power is like human power, just greater. That God's ways are like human ways, just greater. Right? And we hear that all the time. We hear about victory and we hear about strength and we hear about blessing and beauty, you know. If you're gonna be a godly person, then you gotta look great, right? You gotta be fit and put together and have executive style hair, and you know, that's that's righteousness, right? It's how you look and how you appear. No, that's how the world works. That's not God's beauty. It's not how God works. You see, Martin Luther was saying the cross is the ultimate revelation of who God is, it's the ultimate revelation of how He works in the world. The ultimate display of God's glory, the blazing center of his glory, is the cross. The theology of the cross says that God works through suffering, that God's grace is manifested in our failure. You see, theology of glory is like Christianity is about getting it all together, right? And if you fail, well, you're you're on the outs and you better get back in. But the theology of the cross says, oh my goodness, it is through my brokenness that I actually encounter God. It is through my weakness that the power of God is manifested in our life. That's not how it works in the world. Theology of glory says power is just getting it together and gritting your teeth and doing it on your own. The theology of the cross says the power of God is unleashed in my life when I am surrendered, when I embrace weakness. The theology of the cross is this irony that it is in the place of my sin that I fall most deeply in love with Jesus. That's only understood through the theology of the cross. That the place of my weakness, the place of my brokenness, the place of my struggle is the place where I encounter the glory of God. That's the theology of the cross. So here's a question, an application. Have you seen the glory of God? I asked that same question last week. Have you seen the glory of God? Now I'm not asking, have you had an experience in your life? Have you felt something in your life? Those are great. Hope you've had them, just not that big of a deal. Have you seen the glory of God? Rather, has your heart been taken with the cross of Jesus? Has it just grabbed you and you're like, oh my gosh, that's beautiful. Because that's what it means to behold God's glory. To see the fullness of who He is in the wonders of the cross. And it just melts your heart. And you're like, oh, this changes everything. I just I want you to have everything. That's when I see the cross, and and and we need to see the cross every day, like probably a thousand times a day. But but when I see it, when it when it penetrates and I see it with the eyes of my heart, it's like there's this immediate reaction in my heart that I want to say, take it all. Have the whole thing. Like everything is yours. I want to live for you. Now, catch me about 30 minutes later might be a little bit different. I might be like, mine, right? And what I need is just the cross again. But when you see the cross, when you see God's glory in the cross, the heart is just opened. We fall in love with Him, and that reaction is like, I want to serve you. I want you to be known. I want you to be saved. I may I become less and you become greater. It's just like a reaction that happens in the heart whenever we behold the glory of God. You know, we're made to behold glory. That's what it means to be a human being. And we are chasing glory, man, in all kinds of areas. That's why celebrities have got this racket going. Because we're chasing glory. But you see, what we need to see from Scripture is that there is only one glory that will satisfy your soul. And you behold the fullness of his glory in the cross of Jesus. You know, the reality about seeing God's glory, though, is it's kind of like you gotta be shown his glory. You gotta be shown. Right? Moses had to be shown. We gotta be shown. How are we shown? Through brokenness. God brings brokenness into our life. That in that place we would behold glory. You gotta be shown. Right? You know how this works, right? In that moment when it all falls apart, in that moment where the struggles just eat in your lunch, in that moment where the pain of loss or disappointment is overwhelming, in that place, when you go to God, you encounter his glory in that place? What if all those things you're walking through right now? What if the struggle that is eating your lunch? What if the fears that are just dominating your heart? What if the pain that you're carrying right now? What if that that just you're hooked on something you can't let go of, right? What if all of that is God's pursuit to reveal his glory to you? No matter what where you are right now, I encourage you to do this. To go to God and say, like Moses, show me your glory. Maybe it's in the very place of that disappointment or hurt or struggle. God, show me your glory. Listen, God loves to answer that prayer, but let me warn you, it can be painful, but it's so worth it. It is so worth it. Because beholding the glory of God in the cross of Jesus is life itself. So let's let's stop there and discuss it for a few moments. Um, what's happening in you as you wrestle with this, as you hear this, as you think about the glory of God manifested most intensely in the cross. Let's hear from each other and and and we do this as a way to be not just hearers of the word, but doers of it. It's an act of application. And it's an opportunity to just hear. Here's how that challenges me. Here's how I'm trying to work that out in my life. Here's how I don't know what you're talking about. We we just talk, we discuss for a few moments.
SPEAKER_01I was um struck a little bit on um Moses got to that place when he was going to God and basically saying, I can't do this without you.
SPEAKER_04Yeah.
SPEAKER_01And finding that place of need and brokenness, of where seeing that need and seeing what is it that I truly cannot do unless you go ahead of me and do it, you know, with me. Yeah. Um and the the need for you know, true confession and repentance, and that that place where you're seeing your need and your brokenness, and then you're meeting first with God, but comparing that to kind of the self-wrought uh repentance that we so often pursue.
SPEAKER_04Yeah.
SPEAKER_01Instead of also meeting with God in that moment and saying, but but we're we're not going up without you because I can't do this without you. Yes. Right. Yeah.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, that I think whenever we hear repentance, it it can have a negative connotation for us. Because I think we think of repentance as penance, which is a very different thing. You know, penance was a Roman Catholic sacrament, and it meant satisfaction. And so so often, whenever we sin or we blow it big, uh we run from God, but whenever we do come to God, we we have this tendency to want to be like, I'm going to make myself feel so horrible. I'm I'm gonna grovel in my shame, I'm gonna beat myself up in the hopes that God will be like, okay, that's enough. That's enough. You've paid for it now. I see how sorry you are. I say, you know, the attempts in the human heart to pay for our own sin are deeper and more wide-ranging than we even realize. So we take a thing like repentance and we make it into a work. So therefore, we avoid it at all costs. You know, Flannery O'Connor said about one of her characters that uh this religious character that she avoided sin so that she could avoid Jesus. That is a great strategy in religion. I'm gonna try to do it all right just so I don't have to go to Jesus and need him again as a savior, right? But true repentance, like what you're talking about, it is a believing repentance, it is a gospel-centered repentance, it's a coming home. It's a coming to him with assurance of grace. It's turning back, it's going home. You know, it's the prodigal who's, you know, run off into the pig style and he's just starving and broken and haggard, and everything's falling apart, and he says, I think I'm gonna go home. That's repentance. It's just coming home. And what we need to understand is that repeated repentance is progress. And when we repent, heaven throws a party. That's what Jesus said. Right? So repentance is huge, and repentance is how we change. But it's got to be the gospel-centered believing repentance rather than beating myself up, feeling guilty, rolling around in my shame. That's not repentance, that's a work. Lewis.
SPEAKER_02Yes. And then seeing that Jesus voluntarily and willfully went to that for us. And I think seeing that his uh is the kind of the encouragement to persevere. Yeah. And I just wanted to say that.
SPEAKER_04Yes. Thank you, Lewis. I think that's a great little example of how you are to work out the cross. Paul says that we are to walk in line with the truth of the gospel in Galatians. He says that. In other words, we're the way that you live the Christian life is you bring everything in line with the truth of the gospel. You're applying the gospel to everything. And so what you did, you just did that with suffering. Like we, many of us in here have suffering in our life. And it could be big, small, but it could be something you don't want that is in your life, or it could be something that you really want that's not in your life. You know, we we all have suffering. And so the way to faithfully walk through suffering in a way that glorifies Him is to bring it in line with the truth of the gospel. And to be like, wait, the cross changes how I look at suffering. You know, that the theology of the cross says, suffering is brought into my life to bring glory. That's a game changer for suffering. And again, it only comes through the lens of the cross. The theology of glory that dominates much of Christianity is like, man, if you're suffering, well, you didn't get it right. You didn't rub the genie bottle the right way, or you did something wrong, or you need to give a few more dollars. Those are lies, unbiblical lies. That's not Christianity. But the theology of the cross says, no, no, no, wait. Everything God brings into my life is for glory, for my transformation. And the way that transformation happens is through suffering. That resurrection only comes on the other side of the cross. The way to know and experience life is through death. Crucifixion first, then resurrection. And that is the pattern of the Christian life. And so we need to uh recapture suffering and make it gospel-centered, right? And it is tremendous what happens when you do that, when you bring our suffering in line with the truth of the gospel. Thank you, Lewis. And I know you know a little something about it. It's not theory that you're speaking about.
SPEAKER_03So Hutch. Um, they say, like, the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. Yeah. And uh so in the chapter 32 and the calf, the golden calf, where he sends the Levites through the camp and they kill like 3,000 people. Yes. I mean, that's that's pretty serious as far as the wrath and respect. And thank God he sent his son that we get, you know. Yes. But that's pretty freaking your face kind of stuff.
SPEAKER_04Absolutely, yes. Yeah, you and it's intermingled, right? Yeah, it's intermingled with his grace and love. You know, like that that was church discipline happening right there. You know, where they were caught. I mean, thankfully, we don't practice church discipline in that way here. We don't hand out knives and go through and go to work, you know, like they did then. You know, it was God sanctioning judgment on Israel through that. Um but you look at that, and that's very disturbing in our culture because we're like, why are you doing that? Just let it go. Or, you know, they probably didn't mean to, or they probably weren't real clear on the idolatry thing or whatever. They just made a mistake, right? And we we think of sin that way, but God does not. He does not. Like sin is more horrific to God than we could ever daredream. You know, and so it's so good to read the whole Bible because you get to see that. But you gotta feel that tension. And you know, it if you have a God who is gracious and loving and forgiving, who is not just and righteous and holy, then this won't change you. God will become like a granddaddy, like a sugar daddy, somebody I go to to get something, but he's not going to like change my life. He's not going to be someone that I'm like, I want you to have my whole life. He you won't worship him. You just won't. You know, you'll go to get stuff from, you'll manipulate him. That's why we've got to see the fullness of God, and the only way to have God be fully both is with the cross. And so, you know, the culture we will hear a lot, God loves you just the way you are. You know, God is gracious and forgiving and all those things. We hear that, and that is true, but it is true because of Jesus, right? So it's very easy to take the cross out of Christianity because we don't like crosses. And when you do that, you don't have Christianity, you have something altogether different. But yeah, you read the whole Bible, you're like, wait a minute here. What's going on? This God is terrifyingly holy, and it makes that song that we were singing unbelievable. That we can come like little children into the presence of that holy God. Not because we're right, but because of the covering of Jesus. I mean, it's just that's what leads you to worship Him. Yeah.
SPEAKER_05Um, Hutch. I uh I just want to say that this is true, and I know it's true because I experienced some of it this week.
unknownYeah.
SPEAKER_05And I think I've heard you and Ashley talk many times about, you know, going through death and suffering, and there's life on the other side. Um, and I have experienced it before, but I think I just was like, no, you know, I don't really know. I don't really know if that's really, really true. Um, so I just wanted to say that it is because I tasted it and experienced it. And it was it was painful and it was freeing. It was going through pain. Um, and then the Lord met me. And I think that one thing that keeps me from going to Him more often is a fear that he won't meet me, you know, or a fear that if I ask the hard questions, he won't answer. Um, but he did answer, and he's also answered every single time that I have before gone to him. But there's still that fear of like, Lord, what if I go and you don't meet me and you're not there and you don't answer? Um yeah, so I just wanted to say that it is it is true. It's it's painful and it's hard and it's true. And it took time, setting aside time, like extended time with the Lord. And it took um honesty to say, here is what I am thinking, God. Here are my worst fears, here are my my doubts or my questions about you. Um, but he answered, I mean, I like I did not expect him to answer, I don't think, but he did. He answered some of my questions through his word, through repeated scripture passages that were all kind of saying the same thing through through you and through friends and mentors. Um, and then I think just through his Holy Spirit, like being with me. Yeah. Um yeah.
SPEAKER_04And would you say that it was like awakening and renewing in your soul?
SPEAKER_05Yes. Yeah. Like I mean, I think the second half of the week I felt more free and light than I have in a long time. Wow.
SPEAKER_04So would you say joy was greater after the death you experienced?
SPEAKER_05Yes. And it makes me, I still like I want to see more of God's character. Like he revealed so much more of his his heart and his character, and it just makes me thirsty to want to know more.
SPEAKER_04Yeah. Thank you for giving public testimony to God's word, his work in your life. So would you pass that forward? I think Cindy won't share something. We'll we'll probably wrap up with this. This will be last word.
SPEAKER_06Um, just going back to Exodus, and there are a lot of scriptures that just resonate, right? Because there are things you deal with multiple times in your life, and and one of the ones that have resonated is from Exodus, right? That God hardened Pharaoh's heart.
SPEAKER_04Yeah.
SPEAKER_06Right. So there were lots of times in the journey, right, where you see Pharaoh softening. You see Pharaoh coming to what feels like it's going to be repentance, and then God hardens his heart. Yeah. And to us it feels so wrong, right? Like, like that's not how this was supposed to go. Right. But that God, God sometimes puts things in our lives and in what's going on because he needs to do that to reveal his glory. That's right. And and so just a lot of as I struggle with whatever doesn't feel just or doesn't feel fair or why is it this way, right? I have to remind myself that God hardened Pharaoh's heart. Yes. To reveal his glory. Yes. And whatever it is that I don't like or I don't want. Right, right. And it happens a lot, but just resonating on the fact that just because it doesn't feel right to us doesn't mean that it's not ultimately to reveal the glory of God in our lives.
SPEAKER_04Yeah. That's so true. Um God used Pharaoh to increase pain, to increase resistance, to increase wickedness so that he could display his glory more wondrously. And we don't like that because we want God to like let us have our way and let us be free. We're not free. No one is free. Um the actual freedom is when we are under the rule and reign of God. But it's so it's a great way to understand what's happening in our life. Like to look out, like my friend who's walking through the pain of something less than justice for his daughter. I mean, we can all imagine what we would feel like if our children were wronged in a way and we didn't get justice for them. I mean, I can think of few things that would be more like impassioning for me than that. And that's this world. This world is broken. Scripture is very clear about that. But God's kingdom is coming. And one day his glory is gonna fill the earth, his justice is gonna roll down like a mighty river, says Amos. That's good news, right? So it means we can let we can live and face the injustice, knowing that real justice is coming one day. Uh let me pray and call our musicians up. We'll close. Father, we want to see your glory. We need to see your glory more than any other thing. Lord, would you show us? Would you reveal yourself to us? Reveal yourself to us in the cross of Jesus, that we would meditate on the cross and savor it and see in it the fullness of who you are and even who you are for us. Lord, that will change our lives. Would you change us by the power of your cross? In Jesus' name we pray. Amen.