[SPEAKER_00]: Welcome to the preaching ministry of the Agopic Baptist Church in George, South Africa.
[SPEAKER_00]: Good morning.
[SPEAKER_00]: Welcome today that you could be here with us and I trust the Lord will certainly bless you as we look into his Word.
[SPEAKER_00]: I invite you to open to Exodus chapter 3, Exodus chapter 3, we've been looking at just a little bit too much volume here and getting a feedback.
[SPEAKER_00]: We're looking at this passage where the Lord appears to Moses in this famous scene of the burning bush.
[SPEAKER_00]: We know that God appeared there to Him, to call Him, or commission Him, to go back to Egypt, and to be the Lord's messenger to His people, to bring them comfort and the message of the
[SPEAKER_00]: and to bring the people of Israel out of Egypt.
[SPEAKER_00]: And there's a lot that we could learn about Moses and we see in this section going all the way into about the middle of chapter four, that Moses is reluctant to go.
[SPEAKER_00]: But really, especially this section that we're looking at this morning, this is primarily,
[SPEAKER_00]: about a revelation of the character of God.
[SPEAKER_00]: And so we want to look at that some things that we can see in these verses.
[SPEAKER_00]: The first thing I want you to notice is that Yahweh is a God who knows, and included with that concept is that he cares for us.
[SPEAKER_00]: So it could say he's a God who knows encarers, but I think as you think about the biblical concept of God knowing it includes the fact that he cares about us.
[SPEAKER_00]: He's not just distant.
[SPEAKER_00]: And we see that verse 7, but it's a repetition of what he said earlier at the end of chapter 2.
[SPEAKER_00]: Look back there.
[SPEAKER_00]: Verse 24 and 25, and God heard their groanings
[SPEAKER_00]: and God remembered his covenant with Abraham and with Isaac and with Jacob and God sold the people of Israel and God knew.
[SPEAKER_00]: So you see the four descriptions there, God heard, God remembered and God sold and God knew.
[SPEAKER_00]: You know, sometimes we may get to a place where we feel like that God has forgotten us.
[SPEAKER_00]: Or he's just not.
[SPEAKER_00]: paying attention, or he's not, he's indifferent to our troubles, but God has a purpose in all that he does, and that purpose is for our good and for his glory.
[SPEAKER_00]: When the Scripture says that God remembered speaking of the covenant
[SPEAKER_00]: that he had made, the promises that he had made.
[SPEAKER_00]: It doesn't mean that for a time God had forgotten about these promises.
[SPEAKER_00]: Rather, it's a way of saying that God is ready to act.
[SPEAKER_00]: He's going to bring about action and accomplishing His purposes.
[SPEAKER_00]: And we see here that in this case, His actions are for salvation of His people and deliverance.
[SPEAKER_00]: And also, his actions in judgment upon Pharaoh and the Egyptians.
[SPEAKER_00]: Let's read and just for giving some context, let's go back to verse 6.
[SPEAKER_00]: And we'll pick up there for our text this morning.
[SPEAKER_00]: And this is God speaking to Moses from the burning bush.
[SPEAKER_00]: verse 6 says, and He said, I am the God of your Father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob.
[SPEAKER_00]: And Moses hid his face for He was afraid to look at God.
[SPEAKER_00]: Then the Lord said, I have surely seen the affliction of my people who are in Egypt, and I have heard their cry because of their testmaskers, masters, and I know they are suffering.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I have come down to deliver them out of the hand of the Egyptians and to bring them up, out of the land to a good and broad land, a land flowing with the milk and honey, to the place of the Canaanites and the Hittites and the Amarites and the Persasites and the High Vites and the Jebusites.
[SPEAKER_00]: And now behold, the cry of the people of Israel has come to me, and I have also seen the
[SPEAKER_00]: God hears our prayers, it isn't always answer the way that we would like or expect to God answer, but it's not because He doesn't know what our needs are.
[SPEAKER_00]: Rather, it's because He does know what our needs are, that many times He delays an answer.
[SPEAKER_00]: And sometimes his
[SPEAKER_00]: But in any case, we can trust the sovereign wisdom and plan of God for us.
[SPEAKER_00]: And so we see also here, and only he's got to wear, and knows, and cares for us.
[SPEAKER_00]: He's also a God who saves us, or saved again.
[SPEAKER_00]: He says, so I've come down to deliver them from the hand of the Egyptians and to bring them up.
[SPEAKER_00]: from the land to a good land and spacious land.
[SPEAKER_00]: Verse 8 reminds us that God, that this God is a God who will deliver His people and is using this language here of I have come down.
[SPEAKER_00]: And it emphasizes the fact that God is personally involved in this deliverance, the salvation that He's going to accomplish.
[SPEAKER_00]: And we can't help but relate that to our own salvation.
[SPEAKER_00]: As we think about this God comes down.
[SPEAKER_00]: And remember how the Lord came down in the person of the Lord Jesus Christ.
[SPEAKER_00]: to be with us, to live, and to die for us, to deliver us out of the bondage of our sin and the condemnation of eternal death.
[SPEAKER_00]: If you ever get to a point where you begin to doubt that God really cares, just remember the Lord Jesus Christ, and what He has done for us and dying for us in our place.
[SPEAKER_00]: But just as with Israel,
[SPEAKER_00]: God only saves us from something He saves us to something.
[SPEAKER_00]: He's delivered us out of the bondage of sin and He saved us unto Himself.
[SPEAKER_00]: And as He will bring the Israelites unto Himself to worship Him, God brings us unto Himself that we might serve in worship Him forever.
[SPEAKER_00]: Well, a third thing that we see,
[SPEAKER_00]: and the verse is leading up to what I want us to see this morning is that Yahweh is a God who sins also in verse 10.
[SPEAKER_00]: Up into this point, as God is speaking to Moses, I'm sure that Moses has been receiving this message from God as very good news.
[SPEAKER_00]: I mean, God is telling him how he's seen and he has heard and he's going to deliver his people who
[SPEAKER_00]: And I'm sure Moses is all for this message.
[SPEAKER_00]: But now God says in verse 10, so now come and I will send you to Pharaoh.
[SPEAKER_00]: So you shall bring my people, the sons of Israel, out of Egypt.
[SPEAKER_00]: And this is a bit of a shock for Moses.
[SPEAKER_00]: But it's the same kind of message that he has for us, isn't it?
[SPEAKER_00]: God is in his grace, he has chosen us to be part of his plan.
[SPEAKER_00]: Moses would be the flesh and blood that would go and the mouth that would speak to his people and to Pharaoh.
[SPEAKER_00]: He was God's spokesperson.
[SPEAKER_00]: He was the prophet of God.
[SPEAKER_00]: And he would go with the message to Israelites and a message to Pharaoh.
[SPEAKER_00]: And just as God commissions Moses to go with his message, God also commissions us to go with his message, it doesn't he?
[SPEAKER_00]: And the message that he's given us is the message of the gospel, the good news of the Lord Jesus Christ.
[SPEAKER_00]: And just like Moses, we often have excuses, not me.
[SPEAKER_00]: why we're not the right one to go.
[SPEAKER_00]: Or why people won't listen.
[SPEAKER_00]: Or we just, you know, just naturally come up with reasons why this is not a good idea, why, why we can't do it.
[SPEAKER_00]: Or why we're not able.
[SPEAKER_00]: And we see that in Moses in this section in verse 11 and 13 Moses has his first two objections as to why he's not the one that should go.
[SPEAKER_00]: First of all, on verse 11, it relates to His being inadequate.
[SPEAKER_00]: And then the second one, in verse 13, relates to the fear that the Israelites that He goes and speaks to, won't accept Him as coming with God's authority.
[SPEAKER_00]: And so that brings us to this next thing I want to see, and that is that God is the God, or Yahweh is the God who enables, or He could say, He empowers us.
[SPEAKER_00]: to for the work that he has sent us to do.
[SPEAKER_00]: Now it's verse 11 and 12.
[SPEAKER_00]: And we'll see Moses concern here.
[SPEAKER_00]: But Moses said to God, who am I that I should go to Pharaoh and that I should bring the sons of Israel out of Egypt.
[SPEAKER_00]: And he said, certainly, I will be with you.
[SPEAKER_00]: And this shall be the sign to you, that it is I who have sent you when you have brought the people out of Egypt, you shall serve God at this mountain.
[SPEAKER_00]: Now Moses had wondered all the way down into the region of Mount Sinai.
[SPEAKER_00]: That's the mountain of Mount Orab is also Mount Sinai.
[SPEAKER_00]: And God was gonna bring them back to that place, given the law there.
[SPEAKER_00]: and they would come back to that mountain to serve God or worship God, same word, there in that place.
[SPEAKER_00]: So if you're with us, back, we could too go when we were in chapter two, you'll remember that Moses has spent the last 40 years in the desert learning to be nobody.
[SPEAKER_00]: that is nobody special in and of himself.
[SPEAKER_00]: And Moses really had a right or was right in filling in adequate.
[SPEAKER_00]: As you think about the great task that God is asking him to go do, to go in confront Pharaoh and to bring this multitude of people.
[SPEAKER_00]: to lead them out of this bondage in Egypt.
[SPEAKER_00]: So when Moses said, who am I?
[SPEAKER_00]: It really is a right response of inadequacy.
[SPEAKER_00]: Who am I that I should go and lead this people?
[SPEAKER_00]: But what Moses now must learn is that with God, the impossible becomes possible.
[SPEAKER_00]: And that God wills to take nobody's and to use them for his own purposes, for his own glory.
[SPEAKER_00]: And so that is something that Moses is struggling with, he's been 40 years there taking care of sheep.
[SPEAKER_00]: And the father's thing from his mind is now that he is going to be a deliver for his people.
[SPEAKER_00]: so that he can depend upon the sovereign power and the working of God.
[SPEAKER_00]: Paul says it this way in two Corinthians chapter four and verse seven.
[SPEAKER_00]: When he talks about God's working in us, this sovereign working of the Spirit of God in us to bring the light of God to us and to continue to work in us, to transform us, and to change us, and he says,
[SPEAKER_00]: to Corinthians 4-7, but we have this treasure in jars of clay to show that the surpassing power belongs to God and not to us.
[SPEAKER_00]: Well, notice that God really doesn't answer Moses's question in the way that Moses asked the question.
[SPEAKER_00]: God could have answered Moses when Moses said, who am I?
[SPEAKER_00]: Moses, or God could have told Moses in all the ways that God had been working in his life to prepare him for this very work.
[SPEAKER_00]: God could have tried to build Moses up and have a better self-image of himself, but God doesn't do any of that.
[SPEAKER_00]: That is what God says, certainly I will be with you, and that really should have been
[SPEAKER_00]: to answer his objections, his fears, his concerns, and doubts about himself, the fact that God was with him.
[SPEAKER_00]: Because when God is with us, there is nothing and no one that can resist what God wants to accomplish and do through us.
[SPEAKER_00]: When God sins,
[SPEAKER_00]: there to enable, to empower, by his own presence, and his own ability.
[SPEAKER_00]: This is how God commissions us.
[SPEAKER_00]: You know this great commission Matthew 28, or 16 to 20.
[SPEAKER_00]: And God says, through Jesus here speaking to His disciples, and Jesus came and said to them,
[SPEAKER_00]: go there for and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.
[SPEAKER_00]: Teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you, and notice what he says, in behold, I am with you always to the end of the age.
[SPEAKER_00]: Now, that's our commission, the commission of the church, to each believer.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's the same message God gives in a way to Abraham, isn't it?
[SPEAKER_00]: Go, I have all authority, all power, go, I am with you, I am with you.
[SPEAKER_00]: Can't use in His commentary says the sovereignty of God's grace does not make our ministry unnecessary, it makes it mandatory.
[SPEAKER_00]: The work of salvation is God's work from beginning to end.
[SPEAKER_00]: Nevertheless, God uses us as He used Moses to accomplish His saving purpose in the quote.
[SPEAKER_00]: Well, you notice there also that God gives Moses a sign that it is God Himself who had commissioned him.
[SPEAKER_00]: The same was that God was going to bring the people back to that mountain, so that they could serve or worship Him there, but we could ask, well, what good is a sign if it's future?
[SPEAKER_00]: How's that helping me now?
[SPEAKER_00]: I want some reassurance now.
[SPEAKER_00]: And so what God is doing, He's putting the focus on Himself again, not on Moses, and He's saying,
[SPEAKER_00]: that I will do, what I have said I am going to do.
[SPEAKER_00]: Well, the last thing I want us to see this morning and we'll spend our time here versus 13 to 15 is that y'all weigh as a God who is, as a God who is, well, Moses' second objection
[SPEAKER_00]: comes there in verse 13 where it seems to relate to a fear that he has, that the Israelites won't accept that he has any authority from God.
[SPEAKER_00]: Tom Constable in his notes says it this way, Moses' first objection amounted to, I don't think I can do this.
[SPEAKER_00]: And then his second objection was, no one else can think I can do this either.
[SPEAKER_00]: I thought that was pretty good.
[SPEAKER_00]: Verse 13, this is how Moses words it.
[SPEAKER_00]: Then Moses said to God, if I come to the people of Israel and say to them, the God of your fathers has sent me to you.
[SPEAKER_00]: And they ask me, what is his name?
[SPEAKER_00]: Watch, I say to them.
[SPEAKER_00]: Now, that's a bit of a strange question to us, why does his name?
[SPEAKER_00]: And by posing it that way, I think Moses is asking for more than just what God's name is.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I was possible that Moses didn't know
[SPEAKER_00]: God's name is proper name y'all way as we would pronounce it but we believe that's the correct pronunciation or at least as close as we can get.
[SPEAKER_00]: But you realize, in Scripture, oftentimes a person's name has significance about that person, or about his character.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's even often given, as we know, as a revelation, of what that person would be, what his character would be like.
[SPEAKER_00]: And so there is significance to the name.
[SPEAKER_00]: And there's other names of God that are given,
[SPEAKER_00]: And oftentimes they are given specifically as it relates to what God does, or his ability, his character.
[SPEAKER_00]: And this seems to be what Moses is asking for, and the Jews, the Son of Israel, they knew the name Yahweh, they had heard that before.
[SPEAKER_00]: But it's likely they didn't fully grasp the significance of it.
[SPEAKER_00]: And probably because of what Moses, we know he knew of God and he had committed himself to God into the promise of God in Abrahamic covenant, it's very likely that he also knew this name.
[SPEAKER_00]: But he's wanting, it seems, more
[SPEAKER_00]: more information about God.
[SPEAKER_00]: He's anticipating that the Israelites won't be satisfied with Moses just saying the God of your Father's sinning.
[SPEAKER_00]: You remember 40 years before,
[SPEAKER_00]: when Moses confronted these two Hebrews that were fighting and the one was beating the other one and the Moses tries to intervene with this dispute and the man says to Moses, who made you a prince and a judge over us?
[SPEAKER_00]: And so now 40 years later, Moses wants something more than just saying, your father's sent me.
[SPEAKER_00]: And so God is going to give Moses insight here, a revelation into the very character of who God is.
[SPEAKER_00]: Some truth here that he did know before and that would be significant to the children of Israel.
[SPEAKER_00]: Verse 14 and 15, let's read together,
[SPEAKER_00]: And he said, thus shall you say to the sons of Israel, I am, has sent me to you.
[SPEAKER_00]: And God, furthermore, sent to Moses, thus you shall say to the sons of Israel, Yahweh, the God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob has sent me to you.
[SPEAKER_00]: This is my name forever, and this is my memorial name from generation,
[SPEAKER_00]: to generation.
[SPEAKER_00]: Well, when God says to Moses, I am who I am, I don't think he's just evading Moses question.
[SPEAKER_00]: I don't think he's just giving him a riddle that really can't be, doesn't mean anything.
[SPEAKER_00]: I am who I am.
[SPEAKER_00]: And if we said that, you know, that wouldn't
[SPEAKER_00]: But God is emphasizing something here about His nature.
[SPEAKER_00]: I want to read you a section from GotQuestions.org, website, answers, various topics on the Bible.
[SPEAKER_00]: And there's a helpful statement here related to this word.
[SPEAKER_00]: I am, or it's translated, I am, it's the word.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I'm quoting, the word Aya is the first person common singular to the verb to be.
[SPEAKER_00]: It would be used a number of normal situations like I am watching the sheep.
[SPEAKER_00]: I am walking on the road, or I am his father.
[SPEAKER_00]: They go on to say, however, when used as a stand-alone description, I am, is the ultimate statement of self-sufficiency, self-existence, and immediate presence.
[SPEAKER_00]: So, can you make that connection in your mind?
[SPEAKER_00]: Can you see how this I am who I am?
[SPEAKER_00]: God is declaring, I am the eternal self-existent, ever-present God.
[SPEAKER_00]: He goes on to, and I quote, God's existence is not contingent upon anyone else.
[SPEAKER_00]: His plans are not contingent upon any circumstances.
[SPEAKER_00]: He's promises, excuse me, his promises that he will be what he will be, that is, he will be eternally consistent or constant God.
[SPEAKER_00]: He stands ever present and unchangeable, completely sufficient in himself to do what he wills to do and to accomplish what he wills to accomplish.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I want you to, in the quote.
[SPEAKER_00]: the from the godquestions.org there.
[SPEAKER_00]: And so they give us this significance here, at least what we believe is the significance of the Lord saying, I am who I am.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I want you to also realize that this verb, I am, is a form of the proper name of God Yahweh.
[SPEAKER_00]: Now, in your verse 15, we see that that name given Yahweh, and in your most vivals, most translations, it's rendered as Lord with all caps in the O-R-D, and it's slightly smaller capital letters to show that this is a reference to this proper name of God Yahweh, and we believe, again, this is the pronunciation.
[SPEAKER_00]: and you may be wondering why why why is it not translated in our English and why is it listed as Lord and there's quite a history there and the short version is that later point during the intertest of Middle Period before the Lord came to earth in the New Testament's time period.
[SPEAKER_00]: The Jews, at some point, they're established a precedent or a tradition of not pronouncing this name, Yahweh.
[SPEAKER_00]: And it relates to the fear that the third commandment would be broken, that says, do not
[SPEAKER_00]: saying his name in a non-reverent kind of way, they created another law, another commandment that you would be condemned if you said his name.
[SPEAKER_00]: And so what they did instead when they would reading or speaking, they would say the word Adonai, which is another name for God,
[SPEAKER_00]: And so this tradition began, and it began with a good desire to not misuse God's name, but it went beyond what God he commanded.
[SPEAKER_00]: And basically, he created a situation where his name was no longer being pronounced.
[SPEAKER_00]: And in the Hebrew, they did not have vows in the written, this ancient Hebrew, did not have vows.
[SPEAKER_00]: So we're not really sure how to pronounce it, unless you heard it.
[SPEAKER_00]: So unless the name is being pronounced in Spoken, you can see how it didn't take long to the proper pronunciation or the exact pronunciation to fall in a way.
[SPEAKER_00]: And so we have these four letters, why H, W, H, these consonants.
[SPEAKER_00]: This tradition carried over and when the Septuagint translation was written, the Septuagint is the Greek translation of the Hebrew, and that's the translation that would have been available to the average people in the time of Christ, and they followed suit not
[SPEAKER_00]: Curiosity means Lord, and just like Adonai means Lord, and so they translated it that way, and so many years later when we come to English translations in modern translations, they followed suit with the translation Lord, so that's how that came about.
[SPEAKER_00]: But I want you to see in verse 15,
[SPEAKER_00]: that God makes this connection between I.M.
[SPEAKER_00]: statement and His name Yahweh, and it says in verse 15, and God furthermore said to Moses, so He's still explaining what His name of this question that Moses had,
[SPEAKER_00]: And this is what God further says to Moses.
[SPEAKER_00]: Thus, you shall say to the sons of Israel, Yahweh, the God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, has sent me to you.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I'm reading from the LSB translation, the legacy standard Bible.
[SPEAKER_00]: And that's why you have there, they have given the proper name of God
[SPEAKER_00]: where isn't in many of the translation, it's Lord, which the capitalization allows you to see that, but I really like having that distinction made there.
[SPEAKER_00]: So you can recognize, you don't just read past it and don't realize what name is being used.
[SPEAKER_00]: Again, there's a note
[SPEAKER_00]: And quote, it says, so when God used the verb to express His name, He used the form saying, I am.
[SPEAKER_00]: And when people refer to Him as Yahweh, which is a third person, masculine singular form of the same verb, they say He is.
[SPEAKER_00]: So you can see how this name y'all way is closely linked to this statement of I.M.
[SPEAKER_00]: So how does that help Moses?
[SPEAKER_00]: How does it help the children of Israel?
[SPEAKER_00]: And how does it help us to have this information about the name of God?
[SPEAKER_00]: Well, part of the answer is back in verse 12.
[SPEAKER_00]: If you know back there, God uses this same word, A, A.
[SPEAKER_00]: When He promises to Moses, certainly, I will be with you.
[SPEAKER_00]: And this translation, I will be is the future of the word.
[SPEAKER_00]: a year and the word can be future or present according to the context and so most of time it's rendered in the future but it would be just as accurate to say to Moses to give him assurance that he can do what God wants him to do by saying I am with you because God
[SPEAKER_00]: It helps us now and it helps us in the future.
[SPEAKER_00]: It gives us confidence of the presence of God with His people.
[SPEAKER_00]: The same God who made promises to Abraham is making promises to Moses that He will be with him.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's the same God who will be with the children of Israel as they come out of Egypt.
[SPEAKER_00]: all-powerful, self-existent God.
[SPEAKER_00]: In the end of verse 15, there God adds to that concerning His name and saying, this is my name forever, and thus I am to be remembered throughout all generations.
[SPEAKER_00]: There's this thing here that you don't pick up on an English very well, and it relates to Hebrew poetry, and we're told that by the Hebrew scholars that this is a poetical synonym, synonym is two things that are the same or are similar, and the word remembrance
[SPEAKER_00]: have this political likeness or synonym.
[SPEAKER_00]: And that we find often in the songs where you have parallelisms, where one line says it one way, second line says it another way, and there's variations, but that's very much part of Hebrew poetry.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's a rhyming of thought, of truth, and not so much rhyming of words, like our poetry.
[SPEAKER_00]: And we're told here, the point is that by putting these together like this, remembrance and name is to convey that the nature or the character of a person, their name is to be remembered and to be praised.
[SPEAKER_00]: And there's some different illustrations of that.
[SPEAKER_00]: I want to read for you.
[SPEAKER_00]: Psalm 135 verse 13 you can see it clearly there oh y'all way your name is everlasting oh y'all way your remembrance is from generation to generation and it's practically the same thing that God said to Moses isn't it just it's almost words for word what what God had said and and
[SPEAKER_00]: In the end of Hebrews 15, if you're looking at the over-dolling and offer counts, you can see the effort to communicate that.
[SPEAKER_00]: It talks about this is my name and my chadent nom for remembrance.
[SPEAKER_00]: So there's this connection there.
[SPEAKER_00]: And the point is that we are to remember God in praise him for who he is.
[SPEAKER_00]: and his name communicates to us who he is.
[SPEAKER_00]: And we too are to remember.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's not just Israel that should remember.
[SPEAKER_00]: We're to remember in praise God that he is the great I am, the eternal present God who is with us.
[SPEAKER_00]: And he has also revealed himself to us in this way through the Lord Jesus Christ.
[SPEAKER_00]: Jesus on several occasions, identify himself with this description that he'd given to Moses I.M.
[SPEAKER_00]: And on one occasion, when the Jews were contending with Jesus about Jesus' claims, concerning himself in John chapter 8, and verse 56 to 58,
[SPEAKER_00]: We read your father Abraham, rejoice to see my day and saw it and was glad.
[SPEAKER_00]: So did you said to him, you're not yet 50 years old, and how have you seen Abraham?
[SPEAKER_00]: And Jesus said to them, verse 58, truly, truly I say to you before Abraham was, now we would expect Jesus to say before Abraham was, I was.
[SPEAKER_00]: But he uses this word, I am.
[SPEAKER_00]: To communicate, he is the eternal, ever-present, self-existent God.
[SPEAKER_00]: The verse 138 says, Jesus Christ, the same yesterday and today and forever.
[SPEAKER_00]: Also, as I have 44 and verse 6, we see from the Old Testament there, and as I are writing, thus says Yahweh, the King of Israel, and His Redeemer, Yahweh of Host, I am the first, I am the last, and there is no God besides me.
[SPEAKER_00]: And we come to the end of the Bible, the Book of Revelation, as God is the
[SPEAKER_00]: Uh, appearing to John in the person of the Lord Jesus Christ, and he, and he says there in chapter 1, verse 8, I am the Alpha and Omega says the Lord God, who is, who was, who is to come the Almighty.
[SPEAKER_00]: And then just a bit later in his vision that he sees of the Lord in verse 17, he says, I am the first, I am the last.
[SPEAKER_00]: So you can clearly see this referring back to these statements concerning Yahweh.
[SPEAKER_00]: And Jesus is making these claims to be the I.M., eternal, ever-present God who was and is and is to come.
[SPEAKER_00]: Are you ready?
[SPEAKER_00]: Are you ready to meet him?
[SPEAKER_00]: He's coming.
[SPEAKER_00]: It may be today, he's coming back, turn to him, is the only way to be ready.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's not by cleaning up your life.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's not by being a good person, but the repentance and faith.
[SPEAKER_00]: Turn to him and repentance and faith, trust in Christ.
[SPEAKER_00]: Believe that he is, and that he is a rewarder of those who seek him.
[SPEAKER_00]: He's a God who saves, he's a God who sins, and he's a God who is the ever-present self-existent eternal God who is with us, and he is for us, and the person of the Lord Jesus Christ.
[SPEAKER_00]: Amen.
[SPEAKER_00]: And thank you, Father, for this truth this morning.
[SPEAKER_00]: I pray that we might stretch our minds
[SPEAKER_00]: of who you are.
[SPEAKER_00]: Certainly, we cannot fully comprehend what you have revealed to us in your name.
[SPEAKER_00]: I am who I am.
[SPEAKER_00]: But Lord, you've given us enough that we can rejoice in it, and we can remember and we can know that you are present and that you are powerful to accomplish your purposes
[SPEAKER_00]: Well, we thank you that you are present with us to do your work and accomplish your purposes.
[SPEAKER_00]: Help us to trust you.
[SPEAKER_00]: Help us to believe, help us to worship you.
[SPEAKER_00]: We ask in Jesus' name, Amen.