Faith & The Water
Hebrews 11:29 & Exodus 14:10-31
Main Idea: Faith moves forward safely through judgment, trusting God’s sovereign plan & steadfast presence.
I. Fear Not (14:13a)
As the people leave Egypt victoriously (Ex. 12:35-36) and defiantly (Ex. 14:8), God does not lead them out by the quickest or sensible route. Instead, he leads them to what seems like a horrible location and a “trap” with an impassable sea in front & an unstoppable army behind.
Why is God leading his people to this place?
To showcase his power & his glory (14:4, 17-18, 31)
To work in the hearts of his people
“God will take you where you haven't intended to go in order to produce in you what you could not achieve on your own. It is uncomfortable grace, but it is still divine, tender grace.” ~ Paul Tripp
Moses, the mediator between God and his people, exhorts the Israelites to “fear not” in this impossible situation because he trusts God’s sovereign plan and his steadfast presence.
II. Stand Firm (14:13b)
In the face of these circumstances, the Israelites are tempted to turn back to Egypt & their bondage. This is the exact temptation of the recipients of Hebrews: the author is urging them “not to throw away their confidence” (Heb. 10:35) by turning back to Judaism; he reminds them that they are not those who “shrink back and are destroyed, but are those who have faith and preserve their souls” (Heb. 10:39).
“We are often tempted to do the same thing [as the Israelites]. God wants to bring us all the way out of our sins. Our problem is that we only come out part way. We decide to follow Christ, but as soon as we start having problems, we get scared and go right back to our old ways of coping... No matter how much we used to hate it, there was security in the way we used to live.” ~ Philip Ryken
Galatians 5:1: For freedom Christ has set us free; stand firm therefore, and do not submit again to a yoke of slavery.
III. Be Silent (14:14)
Before faith can “go forward” it must be silent & still. In our hurried, busy culture, this posture feels foreign and uncomfortable to us but it is necessary to “see the salvation of the Lord” (14:13).
“I dare say you will think it a very easy thing to stand still, but it is one of the postures which a Christian soldier learns not without years of teaching. I find that marching and quick marching are much easier to God’s warriors than standing still. It is, perhaps, the first thing we learn in the drill of human armies, but it is one of the most difficult to learn under the Captain of our salvation.” ~ Charles Spurgeon
The command to “be still” is a call to remember who God is and who we are (cf. Ps. 46); the Israelites had a mistaken identity crisis here: they were spectators not soldiers (“The Lord will fight for you”). The same is true in the gospel of Jesus Christ.
IV. Go Forward (14:15; Heb. 11:29)
The call to “go forward” in faith meant:
1. Leaving behind the bondage of Egypt
2. Crossing through the waters by God’s grace
The Lord “flanks” his people with his presence as a guard and a guide: the angel and the pillar of cloud behind them, the “staff” of the shepherd in the front, and the “wind” (lit. ‘spirit’) driving back the waters as a wall on each side.
3. Passing from death to life
The waters are simultaneously a place of death and life; the waters of judgment crash down on the Egyptians, but by God’s sovereign grace and power, the Israelites walk across on dry land to new life. Their “baptism” into Moses (1 Cor. 10:2) prefigures our baptism into Christ.
The life of faith is a life of “going forward,” trusting that we have crossed from death to life because Jesus has gone through the “waters of judgment” (Mark 10:38) on our behalf and was raised victoriously from the grave three days later.
