Bible Studies

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My church, The Church of Life, is doing a sermon series on Exodus, with the theme of "The Journey." What's changing in your life lately? Where is God taking you? What kind of spiritual journey are you on? We're studying the Israelites to learn what to do and what not to do on the journey, so that we can make it to the Promised Land - whatever that might be for each of us - with our faith strengthened by what we've seen.

My lesson was on Exodus 17-18.

The first insight is that your character matters. Who you are at your core is very important to God. In fact, who you are determines how far God will take you. A lot of pastors these days really like talking about blessings, about how God will bless you with money or possessions for no good reason at all other than that you're his child. That's a popular teaching, but it's just not true. In God's economy, blessings are almost always tied to obedience. Deuteronomy 30 - written by Moses, the same fellow who wrote Exodus - explains, "You have a choice: you can choose obedience and get blessings and life, or you can choose disobedience and get the consequences of disobedience."

A really graphic illustration of this comes in 1 Samuel 13, where the prophet Samuel confronts the wayward King Saul. Samuel says, "If you had obeyed God, he would have made your throne last forever. But since you disobeyed him, he's going to take away your kingdom and give it to someone else." Saul lost a pretty major blessing because his character - the core of his being - was disobedient to God.

But obedience is only half the equation. God wants true obedience, which is right actions coupled with right attitudes or motivations. In Exodus, including chapters 16 and 17, we see a lot of Israel complaining. Every time something went wrong, they griped at God. Technically speaking, they were obeying him: they were following him on the way to the Promised Land. But they were obeying with a bad attitude, and because of that, their hearts strayed and ultimately they were unable to enter the Promised Land at all. They lost the blessing because of disobedience, but it was disobedience that stemmed from bad attitudes.

Merely right actions or right motivations is not sufficient. 2 Samuel 6 tells the story of a man named Uzzah, who was moving the Ark of the Covenant, which he knew nobody was supposed to touch. While it was being moved, it wobbled and almost fell over, and Uzzah reached out to steady it, knowing full well that he wasn't supposed to (and, indeed, wasn't even supposed to be moving the Ark since he wasn't a Levite priest). He had right motivations, but he was killed anyway because he did something God expressly said not to do. Conversely, we could look at the Pharisees of Jesus' day, who were meticulous about keeping the rules but didn't do it with the motivation of love for God or love for other people, causing Jesus to criticize their dead religion. Right action with wrong attitude or motivation is equally wrong.

How do you know what your actions and attitudes should be like? Compare yourself to the Fruit of the Spirit in Galatians 5:22. That's a good checklist to start on. How are you at being loving, joyful, peaceful, patient, kind, gentle, good, faithful, and self-controlled? If you lack those things, you'll probably have a really hard time figuring out how to have actions and attitudes that please God.

The second lesson is that the people around you on the journey matter. Exodus 17 tells of Israel fighting a battle, defending themselves against a hostile attacker. As long as Moses held his staff above his head, his people prevailed in the battle, but the moment he dropped his arms, his people started losing. After a while, when his arms got tired, two of his friends had to come alongside him and hold his arms up. Moses had to be humble enough to admit that he needed help, and he had to have good, reliable friends (in the middle of that huge crowd of complainers!) who could help him when he needed it.

Similarly, in Exodus 18, we see Moses acting as judge, trying to arbitrate all the disputes that the Israelites - again, a huge nation of complainers - brought to him. His father-in-law, Jethro, called him out: "What you are doing is not good," because it kept Moses from doing the things that were really important, like leading God's people on the journey. Jethro talked Moses into delegating that authority to people who could help. Again, Moses needed to be humble enough to admit that he needed help, and he benefited from people around him who could offer good and reliable advice.

Being able to accept constructive criticism is a surefire mark of someone who is spiritually mature. In fact, not being able to accept criticism is a mark of a "worthless man" according to 2 Samuel 25:17. The question is, who is your criticism coming from? Do you have people in your life who are spiritually mature and whose judgment you trust when it comes to whether you are obeying God with right actions and right attitude?

The third lesson is that the journey is for the purpose of our transformation. Why was God leading his people through the desert? If all he cared about was leading them to the Promised Land, he could have snapped his fingers and put them all there. The only explanation is that the journey itself matters. The process of getting there is just as important as actually being there. God could snap his fingers and make you patient, loving, and financially secure, but he isn't. Why not? Could it be that the process is as important as the result, that you are supposed to be transformed by the journey so you are prepared for the destination?

In counseling, we were taught never to tell a client what is wrong with them. If I know a client is co-dependent, I can't just say it; I have to bring him to that realization himself, because it won't stick in his mind until he owns it for himself. Now, if it's true that the human mind functions that way, it must be because God designed us that way, and therefore that must be how he interacts with us as well. He really could instantly pack us with all knowledge and every kind of spiritual maturity, but he chooses not to. Why? Because the process, the journey, counts for something.

To benefit from the journey, you must commit to being transformed. You cannot end the journey the same person you were when you began it. You must know that the journey will change you, stretch you, grow you, rock your world and rearrange everything you know. But it will end in the Promised Land. Take joy and peace from that.

Those are my lessons from Exodus 17 and 18.

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