Unless my eyes are failing me, I won't take any comments on that. I think I see R. Dickinson back there. Art, it's good to have you back after several weeks of traveling representing the Evangelical Alliance mission in the Far East. I thought of you when the plane went over the edge of the runway in Hong Kong this week. I'm glad you made it out of there. Next to this, Chapter 13 is the focus of our message today and, as it turns out, next week as well.
Having prepared the message earlier on in the week, God has laid some additional things on my heart that I want to share with you this morning, so we're going to take a couple of weeks to look at the subject today, which is provisions for the pilgrimage. If God were angry with America, how do you think He would express that? How long do you think it would take God to bring the mightiest nation in the world to its knees?
In the fifteenth century before Christ, it took God only a matter of months to bring to its knees the world's mightiest nation in that day, Egypt, and to humble her dictator, Pharaoh. Through a series of ten judgments culminating with the death of the firstborn throughout the whole land, He brought that pagan, worldly, and proud nation to a point of brokenness until it was willing to obey His word, let my people go.
On that night of the final plague, we noted last week that the firstborn of the Jews did not die if the family had believed God's promise and had trustingly sacrificed the Passover lamb. For the blood of that lamb having been applied on the door as God commanded, that home was then spared from the judgment of death. The killed lamb was the substitute who died in place of the firstborn.
And as we studied last week, that is a beautiful, dramatic, and prophetic picture of the death of Christ, the Lamb of God. For His death on the cross was in the place of the sinner, and His death provides for the sinner an escape if he will believe on the Christ who died for Him and rose again. The blood of Christ provides protection from deserved judgment of eternal damnation and death.
Those protected by Him are guaranteed safety, and those not protected by His death face guaranteed punishment. It's that clear. That night, the resident population of Egypt was further reduced by the departure of some two million people as the Israelites left Ramesses and journeyed as a large mass of people toward the southeast. Let's read about that in Exodus, backing up first at chapter 12 and verse 37.
The sons of Israel journeyed from Ramesses to Sukkoth, about 600,000 men on foot, aside from children, and I might add women. So if you add the children of women with the 600,000 men, you'd come up with about two million people, most probably. And a mixed multitude also went up with them, along with flocks and herds, a very large number of livestock.
They baked the dough which they had brought out of Egypt into cakes of unleavened bread, for it had not become leavened since they were driven out of Egypt and could not delay nor had they prepared any provisions for themselves. The time that the sons of Israel lived in Egypt was 430 years, and it came about at the end of 430 years to the very day that all the hosts of the Lord went out from the land of Egypt.
That is, 430 years from the time that Jacob went down to Egypt, being provided for, as you recall, by his son Joseph, whom God had sent before him. It goes on to say, it is a night, this night of the Passover, to be observed for the Lord for having brought them out from the land of Egypt. This night is for the Lord to be observed by all the sons of Israel throughout their generations. You will notice that accompanying the two million Israelites was a mixed multitude, it says in verse 38.
These were other Semitic peoples, not Jews, not sons of Jacob, but Semites, and there were also probably some Egyptians who left with them. This mixed multitude later caused problems by bringing division to the nation of Israel. They attached themselves to this migration or this movement, but they did not share the calling or the vision that God had given to Israelites.
Throughout their time as a part of this people, they remained on the fringe, they wanted to share in the blessings of getting away from Egypt, but they did not want to commit themselves to the vision that God had given the nation of a promised land. In the release, God brought his people out of bondage and into freedom, but that was not the end of their problems or their trials.
Indeed, they still had much to learn about God, and most of what there is to learn about God cannot be learned in seminary or in a Bible study. It's fine to learn the facts there, and that's where we begin, but we learn to know God in the crucible of our life's experiences. And so God is now about to take the people of Israel through experiences to teach them of himself. He has told them something about himself.
He is Yahweh, the self-existent one who is able to provide for their needs, but now they must learn that in their own experience. You see, redemption is only the beginning of God's dealings with his own, just the first step. Charles Swindoll has said, the conversion of the soul is the miracle of the moment, but the making of a saint requires a lifetime. As we look in these next chapters at what God is doing with Israel, he is attempting to make a nation of saints.
They have been redeemed by the blood of the Passover Lamb, but they have very much to learn of him. They were at this point beginning a long pilgrimage toward the promised land, and their faithful covenant-keeping Yahweh, the Lord, Jehovah, would provide for them along the way. The lesson that I want us to see primarily is this, that the Lord provides yet today for his own as we face our pilgrimage in this world. It seems to me that pilgrims have several basic needs.
They would include encouragement, protection, guidance, and certain reminders. Pilgrims need encouragement for their trials, because trials are a part of the experience of every alien and pilgrim in the land. Pilgrims need protection from their enemies, for they have them. Pilgrims need guidance for their way, because they are not at home. That's why they're called pilgrims. And pilgrims need reminders for their forgetfulness, because pilgrims, like all humans, tend to be forgetful.
I want you to notice that God provides all four of these for the people of Israel, and I hope that we'll learn as well that God provides them for us too. First of all, notice with me that God gave them His promise to encourage them. And now we look in chapter 13 and verse 5.
Moses is speaking for God, and it says in verse 5, and it shall be when the Lord brings you to the land of the Canaanite, the Hittite, the Amorite, the Hivite, and the Jebusite, which He swore to your fathers to give you, a land flowing with milk and honey, that you shall observe this right in this month. Now verse 11. Now, it shall come about when the Lord brings you to the land of the Canaanite, as He swore to you and to your fathers, and gives it to you.
I want you to notice that right up front of their pilgrimage, God here gave them again His promise. God says through Moses, through your fathers, I swore to give you the land of the Canaanite, a land with agricultural prosperity where all of your needs in that realm will be met. I swore it to them, and I swear it to you, He is saying. God gives them His promise to encourage them, because God knew what lay ahead.
God knew the discouragements that would tempt them, so He reiterated His promise to them. He did not want them to become discouraged along the way. Discouragement is one of the devil's greatest tools, especially against the newly saved, the newly redeemed, but not just the new converts either. There are few diseases of the spirit which are more effective in crippling our effectiveness. Have you ever faced it? Have you ever faced the temptation to discouragement and yielded to it?
Well, if anyone here would deny that, he would have to confess some other sins in his life, because all of us have faced that and have yielded to it from time to time. Discouragement, that cold and clammy condition of the soul, where it is perpetually cloudy and grisly, where no sunshine ray seems to come through. We've all been there. And for the Israelites, the first discouragement was right on schedule.
If you look in chapter 14, you'll find the record of the children of Israel being trapped beside the Red Sea. And it says in verse 10, and as Pharaoh drew near, the sons of Israel looked and behold, the Egyptians were marching after them and they became very frightened. So the sons of Israel cried out to the Lord. Then they said to Moses, is it because there were no graves in Egypt that you have taken us away to die in the wilderness? That is biting sarcasm.
For the Egyptians were famous for their graves. And now they're saying, weren't there enough graves in Egypt? Why have you dealt with us in this way, bringing us out of Egypt? Is this not the word that we spoke to you in Egypt? Didn't we tell you, Moses? Leave us alone that we may serve the Egyptians. For it would have been better for us to serve the Egyptians than to die in the wilderness.
Now before you point your finger too hard at them, remember you might have said the same things if you had been there. For here they are, newly released from the land of Egypt, and behind them come the armies of Pharaoh. They are dismayed and discouraged. But God gave His promise to them. Notice in verses 13 and 14 what those promises were. Basically it was, don't be afraid. Stand still. God is going to fight for you while you keep quiet. The promises of God put an end to discouragement.
Now we could trace that some more if we had the time this morning, but we don't. The answer to discouragement though is a review of the promises of God. For Israel it was the purpose of God to bring them to the land of promise, to Canaan. Now what about us and our discouragements? Are there promises that can lift us from that pit? Are there promises that can cause the clouds to break up and the sun to shine through? Well of course there are.
Promises like Romans 8.28, which we're going to look at tonight in our message. Promises like 1 Thessalonians 5.24. All is He who called you who also will do it. I want you to notice that in light of the promise that God gave, Moses at least took a step of faith. Here in chapter 13 once more I want you to notice what he did according to verse 19. As they were about to leave it says, Moses took the bones of Joseph with him.
For he had made the sons of Israel solemnly swear saying, God shall surely take care of you and you shall carry my bones from here with you. Moses took a step of faith on that day that they left because he dug up the bones of Joseph, now dead long centuries, and took that sarcophagus with him out of the nation of Egypt. Why? Because he knew that eventually they would arrive back in the promised land and he would be able to bury those bones where it had been promised they would be buried.
There in the land that God swore to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. What a great statement of faith this was on the part of Moses. All of us face temptation to discourage them from time to time. This morning I want to share with you a very personal note and illustration regarding that. I do this not easily and with some fear and trepidation, but I do it because I've been exhorted to share more of how I feel with the congregation. I want to do that though I don't find it naturally easy.
I also do it with some fear and trepidation because what I'm going to say can be so easily misunderstood. When you try to say something in a matter of a few short minutes, it's easy for it to be imbalanced in its presentation and it's easy for it to be taken out of context by the hearers. So with all of that in mind and asking your pardon and your mercy, please hear me out as I talk about what I need to talk about this morning to be obedient to the hand of God upon me.
And believe me if I didn't sense His hand upon me strongly to say these things, I would never say them in this forum. But I need to tell you that I have faced temptation to discouragement in the past three months regarding the ministry of Grace Church Roseville. I did not say that I had yielded to it because I don't believe that I have, but I have been faced with the temptation toward discouragement with the ministry in this place.
It has been the lowest time of my seven and a half years of ministry here because of disappointments that I as your pastor have felt very keenly. Suddenly got very quiet in here, didn't it? I have spent a lot of time evaluating my ministry here over the last three months and I'm not finished doing that yet. You say, well pastor, what has caused the temptation to discouragement? Let me share it with you.
There are a number of factors and some of you will not appreciate some of the things I'm going to say, but that's the way it will have to be I guess. First of all, I must tell you that I was personally disappointed with the results of the Sharing the Vision campaign. Now I've tried to be upbeat about the campaign and there are some very strong points to be upbeat about. And we've emphasized those.
That I am opening up to you and being transparent this morning and I expect to receive flack for doing that. But I need to be honest with you and tell you that I was disappointed. I was encouraged by the fact that there were 300 or so who did the very best they could in the response and I believe that with all I'm worth.
But frankly I was disappointed that there were a goodly number who apparently, while coming to our church, have so little commitment to the ministry that God has called us to, that they wouldn't or didn't return any of their commitment cards. Not even to pray or to serve or to give. I'm not speaking about 10 or 20 but I'm speaking about a couple of hundred individuals or families in our church, some of you sitting right here this morning.
Now several people have said to me, well I didn't turn my cards in but I intend to do that and I appreciate that. During the campaign I have heard several critical remarks. I find these dismaying very frankly. I've heard some say we didn't get enough information. There wasn't enough communication. And yet as I have tried to go back and as objectively as I possibly could I've tried to evaluate what we did in the campaign.
The number of letters that went out to the congregation as a whole, the testimonies that were given on Sunday night all through the month of April. The personal remarks that were made each Sunday morning except one during the month of April. The other brochures that were printed and given to the congregation. Communication is a two-way street. There must be a speaker but there must also be a faithful hearer who will listen.
I find it difficult to accept that criticism that there wasn't enough communication because I believe it was there had it been heated. And then I've heard the criticism that it was a slick presentation. That it was too professional. And my response to that is had it been sloppily done and we have done some things sloppily around here there would have been the criticism that it was slip shot and not well done.
And when something is finally done well there are at least a few who say it was too slick a presentation. I find that distressing frankly. And then there were those who said there was too much of an emphasis on money. We seem to be talking about ministry and all of a sudden money was mentioned. And my response to that has been multi-fold and I can only share part of it with you. Thus you probably won't get a fully balanced response to that statement from my heart.
But I wonder if people realize that ministry takes money. Organized ministry takes money to operate. What was the point in the presentation? Now there were those who felt that the cluster meetings were too over-emphasized on money. And if you look at that one evening as the only presentation perhaps that would be the case. And it was rightly so. Because the purpose of that night was to explain what commitments were being asked for.
And the one part of the commitment that needed the most explanation was the money aspect, the financial aspect. And thus a thorough explanation was given in that area. Some of you are not comfortable with this, I'm sorry, but I have to say it to you to be honest. If you look at the financial emphasis in the campaign as a whole you will find that there was absolutely less of an emphasis on money than upon any of the other things that we talked about.
The negative remarks by those within our congregation that have shared those, the lack of response from a broader group makes me wonder. It makes me wonder why when the very same approach has been used by the same organization, Nehemiah Ministries, in hundreds of other churches, why it is in 99% of the others there were no such negative remarks as those. Why is it in our church there is that one out of a hundred that makes those kinds of critical and negative remarks?
It makes me wonder why that's the case. I'm curious about that and frankly I don't have the full answer to it. We met a couple of weeks ago as leaders, a broad group of leaders from various aspects of our church to evaluate the campaign. It was a very positive session because the results in one perspective are very positive. There are a few things that we think should have been done differently, but there are some. I think that would be inevitable.
I thought that our consultant gave us an interesting concept and input when he said that in their experience with the cities here in Minnesota, the Twin Cities, that they have yet to have what they would call a successful campaign on the St. Paul side of the Twin Cities. When asked to elaborate upon that, he said, and I tend to agree with him, that there seems to be a spiritual stronghold of Satan on this side of town. Why that is the case, more than perhaps in other areas, I don't know.
But it's something we need to pray about and attack with spiritual weapons. I have sensed that to be the case. Whether there is as much church swapping on the other side of town as there is on this side, I don't know. I suspect there may be. The fact is that the same campaign done in several other churches at the very same time this spring in other parts of the city had very different results, very positive responses in every area.
The reason that we got into the campaign was to determine what the future ministry of Grace Church Roseville should be, how we're going to continue to minister effectively to people. The limited facilities that we have are crippling us. Now, there are some people who disagree with that, but I must say I believe those people have not thought it through nor evaluated the facts carefully.
We felt that as a result of the campaign, if God blessed and we were enabled to reduce our indebtedness in three years, that would allow us then to move ahead. But the results of the campaign are a bit ambivalent in that way, and frankly I'm not sure what the campaign tells us at the end. I do rejoice in the fact, as I said before, that there were over 300, almost 300 people who responded and did the very best that they could.
And the result of that is going to be a significant reduction in our indebtedness. But it doesn't free us in three years and allow us to move ahead in ministry. Another temptation to discouragement, frankly, that I have faced as your pastor is hearing statements like these. We talk too much about becoming a larger church. We need just to be concerned about who's here, about being a strong church and a Bible-believing church. Now I can identify with some of those remarks.
I believe that we must be a strong church and a Bible-teaching church, and we cannot compromise those things. I'm committed to the principle that if we build deep, God will take care of the breadth of it. But there seems to be an underlying thought in that statement that I'm hearing, which says we're all that we want to be. We don't need to reach any more people. We don't need to be a larger church.
The only reason that we need to think in terms of being a larger church is so that more individuals can be reached and helped who need the message that we have to give. To some, it must seem unspiritual to think in terms of an expanding ministry, but I don't believe that to be the case. The larger a church becomes, the more fragile it becomes. Although it does seem to some that that would be the opposite, and that would seem to be the natural reasoning, but it's not the case.
The larger any church becomes, the more fragile it becomes. But also, the more effective it can become in reaching not just a community, but a region. From the very beginning of our ministry here in 1981, God gave us a vision to fully develop this location. This room was not built to be a sanctuary, except for a few years. Our vision has been from the beginning to expand and fully develop this location while at the same time branching out. And that continues to be my vision.
That's why I'm discouraged about hearing statements like that, or tempted toward discouragement. And it changed gears a bit. I'm tempted toward discouragement over some matters of ministry in our church. It seems that we have so few who are willing really to commit themselves to one of the most critical aspects of our ministry. I'm talking about the children's ministry. I don't know how you feel about your children or your grandchildren, but I know how I feel about mine.
I want them to have committed people working with them. I want them to be in that kind of a church. But we are finding in our church an attitude that says, I'll work with the children's ministry for a quarter, then let somebody else do it. Or I'll fill in until you can find somebody else. Ladies and gentlemen, children need somebody who will be committed to them. Not for a quarter, not until somebody else can fill in. But they need adults who will pour their lives out for them.
And we're not there. I thank God that we are there with a number of people. There are some people who have actually burned themselves out in our children's ministry. Some who are getting out this fall because they have been in there for five and six years and they are completely exhausted and drained. I can only respect their desire to do something else for a while. But I wonder where the commitment is to ministry, especially to our children. I'm tempted to discouragement about that.
This morning there are 20 slots open in our children's ministry. I'm not talking about theory. I'm saying there are 20 places where teachers and assistants and helpers need to be this morning. There are 16 places in Iwanta clubs that are not filled. And yet that ministry is supposed to start in two weeks. Now I realize not everyone's called to be a part of the children's ministry of Grace Church or any other church. We have to be gifted and called to do that.
But my question is where are the people that God has called and gifted to be a part of our children's ministry and where is the commitment to that? And I feel led of God to say one more thing regarding my own battle with discouragement. It is the criticism that has been leveled toward by some, only some, but only some can affect a whole congregation. A little leaven leaveneth the whole lump. The criticism leveled by some against our elders. Men that I know to be humble.
Men that I know to be searching God for His wisdom for our church, His will. Men who are full of integrity and honesty, but who by some are not trusted. Now I recognize that that comes out of the background of some people. I know that some have come to our church carrying a lot of emotional baggage from past situations. I'm sorry about that. I truly am. I grieve for some of the stories that I hear, but I beg of you, do not drop your bags in this church.
If you have brought baggage with you regarding an attitude about elder leadership in a church, do not drop your bags here. They're not welcome. From the very beginning, our church has been organized in such a way that we commit to those men that God raises up in our church major decisions regarding its ministry and its future. We have done that because it is biblical. It's biblical.
We have not done it because there are some who desire to usurp authority in the church or to run off with the church or to have their way in the church. Our elders frankly have talked very frankly about the fact that there has not been good communication between elders and congregation. We have tried in the past, folks, to take some steps in that direction, and we have been met halfway by very few people.
We have some other ideas that we're going to try this fall that I trust will be helpful in opening up communication. All of the elders' meetings are open, including the one this Tuesday night. Anyone can come and participate. There is nothing in secret except those matters of discipline and some matters of personnel that for appropriateness must be in secret. But there is nothing in secret.
But it has been disappointing to me to see the attitude of some people regarding the kind of church leadership that from the beginning we've had here in our church. We are not going to change that. We believe it's biblical, and that's what we intend to practice here by God's grace. We want to practice it well. Undoubtedly there are some ways in which we can prove it, and communication is one. But we're committed to that kind of leadership in our church.
I've been very frank with you this morning. I've not been so frank with you in eight years. And there may be some of you who are so offended that you're angry at me. Perhaps you feel that you can't even come back. I'm sorry if that's the case. I truly am. I am not angry with you. What I have said this morning has not been one wit and anger. I am not angry.
But I am very transparently saying to you as your pastor that I have struggled more than I have ever struggled in this ministry with disappointment and discouragement in the past three months. And I don't feel that I've given in to discouragement for a couple of reasons. Very practically in the first place I got some vacation time and was able to rest, which I needed very badly. And I thank God for the physical and emotional energy and refreshment that that has given to me.
Had I not had that, I'm not sure that I could have stood here this morning and said the things to you that I have, very honestly. But I've not given in to discouragement for a second reason, and this is the key reason. And that is because I believe the promises of God. You see, God gives us His promises to encourage us so that when we struggle with discouragement and the enemy comes with his full load against us, we're able to stand in that day of evil and having done all to stand firm.
I am not discouraged today. In fact, I must say to you in spite of what I have shared with you, and I know it's been kind of heavy, that I am actually encouraged. I'm encouraged as I look to the fall and I see the ministries that are in place and about to be in place. Some brand new ones that we've not had before, like the single parents, for example. I am excited because of the prospects that are before us.
I am encouraged by the promises of God that faithful is He who has called us, who also will do it. What He has called us to do, He will enable us to accomplish. But I struggle within with the knowledge that we as a church are at Kedish Barnea today.
We're at a point of making a decision as a congregation as to whether we as a group are going to trust God and move ahead and get past some of these things that I've talked about this morning and some others and go on and get on the positive and see what God can do and believe God for big things or we're going to go the other direction. We are seeing the beginning of the pilgrimage for a generation as we come to Exodus chapter 2, verse 13.
This generation with the exception of two people never made it to what God called them to. Because of criticism, because of gossip, because of unbelief, because of grumbling and complaining, they died in the wilderness under the judgment of God and never realized what God wanted them to have. I pray that all of us would stand with Caleb and Joshua and that we would be able to say at our Kedish Barnea, Lord God, there are enemies. There are temptations to discouragement.
There are some things that need to be better. But God, you're faithful and you're able. And today I will trust you. I will be a part of the solution, not a part of the problem. Let's bow together. I'm not exactly sure where this message leaves us today, except that I hope it leaves all of us pensive and thoughtful. Because I know some of you have struggled with discouragement just as I have.
Some of you leaders in our church, some of the staff and elders, some of the small church leaders, some of the Sunday school leaders and other leaders, I know you've struggled. And others of us are struggling with discouragement at home or at work. I plead with all of us today to get our eyes on the promises of God so that when the temptation to discouragement comes, when we enter that trial, we will not fall, but go on and endure.
I wonder if by the uplifted hand there would be some who would join me today and say, yes, I'm going through a battle with discouragement. Now maybe you've fallen to it and you've been discouraged or maybe you haven't. You're struggling with it. But would you say this message has caught me at a point in my life where I need a fresh view of God's promises? Would you lift your hand and put it down? Many, many, many.
Father, I thank you this morning for the liberty that you've given to me to be very transparent with the congregation. And I pray for some who undoubtedly are reacting within to some of the things I may have shared. And I pray that you will say to them whatever you in love would say to them. May all of us have an ear open to your voice as we respond to what you want us to do and to be.
May we be people of the Book, people who believe the promises, people who are ready to march ahead, people who are willing to be and ready to be all that you've called us to be. For you're faithful, the one who has called us, and you will do it. In Jesus' name, amen.