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 e don't have to fight the battles of faith and flesh alone. When we "return to the Lord," He can help us fight the battle of faith, reminding us of His promises to us, and His call on our life. Then He can remind us that His arm is strong, and He will fight the battle of the flesh, too. (Message: Eric Elder; Worship Song: "Forever" written by Chris Tomlin, led by Eric Elder; Running Time: 30:43) Lesson 7 - God Helps Us With Both BattlesWatch The Video
Read The Transcript ERIC: Hi, this is Eric Elder, and welcome to The Ranch. Last time we looked at how Moses had to fight two battles. He was fighting the battle of the faith and the battle of the flesh. And tonight we're going to look at how God helps us with both of those battles. There's something I love about this message, too, because we'll see Moses is so very real. Sometimes we think that Moses is this statue out there, and he's just this monument that we can go and touch and worship and say wow, that's Moses, this big man of faith. But we'll see again in this chapter that he is struggling with his faith just like everybody else, just like we do all the time. He struggles with whether he heard from God correctly. He struggles with what to do next when things go south. And we're just going to see that today. I'll tell stories of faith. I'll tell how God has brought me through. Maybe God says go to Israel and I've flown to Israel and done different things over there and I'll come back and they'll say wow, what a man of faith. I'll be like, "You don't know how much I was shaking in my boots the whole way, the whole time, the things that are going on." And I try to tell people that, and they just ignore that. They just gloss over my words, they don't believe me. And it's a fact that you just -- when you walk in faith, when you step out in faith, you will be bombarded by doubt and frustration and different things like that. But there is no reason that has to get you down and stop you! And that's what I'm trying to encourage us to do tonight, to know that God will help us with our battles; both battles, the battle of the faith and the battle of the flesh. So we're going to pick it up tonight in Exodus, Chapter 6, Verses 1 through 12. And the guys in the room are going to read it here and go around, and if you want to read on-line, you can read in the transcript or you can just listen to the guys as they read. Exodus 6 starting in Verse 1 through 12; this is a conversation actually between Moses and God. And backing up just a couple verses in Verse 22 of Chapter 5, it says that Moses returned to the Lord and said,
So he's coming back to God, he's returning to God, which is what we should do when we have to fight these battles, return to God. And here's this conversation that Moses has with God, and this is God speaking in Verse 6. Scott, have you got that first couple verses there?
ERIC: Someone else?
ERIC: Someone else?
ERIC: Great. And then the rest of Chapter 6 talks about the family of Levi and all the people that Moses and Aaron were talking to. But, backing up through this, there are a few things that God does and says, and there are some major things that God will say to us when we're facing these questions of doubt. And if you look back through there, one is that He promises to help them fight the battle of the flesh, fight this physical battle. Look back in Verse 1. Look what he says it's going to be because of, that God would drive the people out of his country. RICH: Mighty hand. ERIC: Because of my mighty hand. So God said, "You need some strength, You need some physical oomph behind you, You got it. You've got my mighty hand. My mighty hand is what's going to let Pharaoh drive the people out." He's going to cause it with His mighty hand. He also reminds him, Moses, reminds him of some things starting in Verse 2. What are a couple things that He reminds them of in Verse 2? SCOTT: That He's the Lord. ERIC: He says, "I am the Lord. I am the Lord. He reminds him that He appeared to a couple of his fathers here, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. So He reminds them that this is His plan. This is His covenant that He made. He said "Moses, I have made a covenant with your forefathers and I am going to keep my covenant." And sometimes we need to be reminded that this is God's plan. This is in His hand and He wants to do this. And then he does something else here. He tells them, He tells them what the end results of all this will be. He tells them what's going to happen. You guys see that in there somewhere? What's He going to do? DALE R.: Pharaoh's going to drive the people out of there. ERIC: Pharaoh's going to drive the people out. And where's he going to drive them to? SCOTT: He's going to give them the land of Canaan. ERIC: He's going to give them the land that He promised to them. He says, "I will bring you into the Promised Land." So God does these three things.
Then look at the very last verse that you read there. What is Moses' reply to all this good news? What does Moses say in Verse 12? God says, "All right, I'll be with you, I got my covenant, I got my mighty hand, now go tell Pharaoh what you just told the Israelites." What does Moses say? SCOTT: If the Israelites won't listen to me, why would Pharaoh? ERIC: "God, if they didn't listen to me, my own people don't listen to me that I'm coming to save, why would Pharaoh listen to me? When I'm a man of faltering lips, when I speak with faltering lips." And here the Israelites, they're not too thrilled with him again, are they? They just don't believe him. They say, "Hey, bud, why don't you go back to the desert? My life was better before you came." AL: This is just like us reasoning, you know. ERIC: Moses is reasoning. AL: He looks at his own faults. ERIC: Yeah, exactly. Exactly. He says, "This ain't working out too good, God, and I don't foresee it getting any better talking to Pharaoh." DEE: And it's not going to either. ERIC: And it's not going to. That's encouraging. You've read ahead, I know. You know what happens. But eventually it does, and eventually God's strength does come through. And eventually God brings them into the Promised Land. But it's not without fighting these battles of the faith and the battles of the flesh. But here in Verse 12 we see Moses as a very real, very human person, just like any of us. Even when God does gives us His promises, we say, "Yeah but, yeah but." And these are big yeah "buts" here, very big. Because it's costing them plenty; it's costing them plenty. And it does cost us when we step out in faith, when we try to go do what God calls us to do. It doesn't always go south. It doesn't always have to be bad, so it's not a negative thing, "Oh, gosh, you have to prepare yourself and brace yourself." But what I want people to do is to not be surprised when things go wrong, and to not back off when they go wrong. Because our tendency is to back off and say, "Okay, maybe God's not in this, maybe this isn't working out the way I planned." I picture the disciples when Jesus gets caught and arrested and they all bail, because they're like, "Oh, yeah, we're with you, we're going with you, we'll go to the death," Peter says. But then he gets caught, starts getting beaten. The disciples are out of there. Why? Because they said, "This isn't what was in the plan; this isn't looking like the kingdom's coming back like we thought it was going to." Of course, it was and it was playing out exactly as it was foretold, exactly as Jesus had told them. But Jesus had to go through the death and resurrection before they were able to see and before their eyes were opened that yes, this was exactly according to plan. This was exactly what God wanted from the beginning. So I want us as men of faith, as women of faith, to not back off when God calls us. The best way to do that is to return to the Lord and find out for sure, "God, is this really you?" Because sometimes it's not. Sometimes there's a problem and we need to correct that before going on. But a lot of times it's really God, and this just goes with the territory of stepping out in faith. But I want us to be men of faith going forward. And if we go on a missions trip or we go on some project or we go to do something, or even recording these broadcasts, if things start to go crazy and start to go haywire and all of a sudden we say, "Wow, maybe God's just not in this anymore, maybe we'll just stop altogether," we need to return to the Lord before we stop because God has called us. And then we need to choose like Moses faced a choice here. When God spoke, Moses had a choice. Did he go to Pharaoh or does he not go to Pharaoh? And we all face that choice all the time. That's our free will that we have. Are we going to go forward, or are we going to stop? And my encouragement is to go with the Lord, go forward. Even looking at your faults, go forward, go forward. I brought a little reminder here. For me this is something that happened to me when I first started doing the Internet broadcasts, when I said, "All right, I believe that what I'm supposed to do is Internet ministry full-time and really make this a full-time venture." And I had this dream one night that really confirmed it to me, and you may think the dream is totally crazy, but that's okay, it wasn't your dream; it was my dream. And God doesn't often speak to us through other people's dreams, but He will speak to us through our own! And I had this dream and in the dream, there's an envelope wrapped in a bag, like you have a grapefruit bag or something that has oranges in or grapefruits. And this envelope, when I took it out of the bag, it had some money in it and said, "Don't worry about the money," is what I was hearing from God. Don't worry about the money, that I have called you to preach on the "net," and this was the net that was in the dream. And it said, "I have called you to preach on the net and I will provide for you. I'll provide everything you need, and you're not to worry about that." Well, we moved from Dallas and we moved back to Illinois and we have no money in the bank and what do you think I do? I worry about that! I worry about that. And I think there's a valid time to worry about money and to be wise with what we're doing. But I kept coming back to that and saying, "God, is this really you? Because financially this is going to be very difficult, not to work a regular job, just to trust you and to go forward." And this image of this dream would come back to me and the net and God providing money. He said, "I will provide the money for you." And when I would go through really down times financially, which is, you know, every other day or so. :) But no, but when that happens, then I start questioning God, and I say, "God, is this still what you want me to do, or do you want me to go take another job, go do something else. There are other things I could do that at least I think I could make a lot more money doing than doing this." And God will remind me, He'll say "No, this is what I've called you to do." And it got to the point where I would come back to that dream so much that I finally just took a net off a bag of grapefruit, and I just set it on my counter. I actually set it, when I would want to hide it, I'd put it in my bill drawer with my bills. And it would just sit in there and when I'd think about the bills I've got due and how is God going to come through this time or this week or this month, and I would just come back to that, and I'd just say, "I don't have to worry about that. God said he would take care of it," and immediately it [the fear, the lack of faith] would be gone. Because I had something to remind me, much more tangible and visible of the commitment that God has made to me. I have had various episodes. One I mentioned last time about praying for God to enlarge our territory, and God provided this USA Today article. And at the same time, my finances were lower than they'd ever been, and that caused me to get up in the middle of the night several nights and just call out to God and say God, "I lay it all before You again. Whatever You want to do, I'll do it. You just to have tell me what You want me to do." And God says, "Pick it back up, pick it back up and keep going." And I did and we kept going. Last fall, I had another opportunity to go work at another company, came up and I talked to Lana and we looked at it and I said, "You know, this could be really good. We could do this for a period of time and this would be really great. This would help us out financially, we'd be able to continue in a stronger way than ever before." And yet my heart was really torn, because I felt so called to doing what I'm doing right now. And I had to go before the Lord and that's when I started a period of extended fasting and praying. And it was a few days into that fast and prayer that God really confirmed it. As I returned to the Lord, He kept speaking to me His promises and saying "Eric, I am with you. My strength will be with you. I will provide for you, and this is my idea," God says. "This is my plan, and I will promise you that this will end up in a place where I am there, so keep pressing forward." So the whole rest of my fast and prayer really was a great time of just continuing to hear from God and talking to Him and communing with Him rather than worrying about what to do with my earthly life. But this happens regularly to me where I have to return to the Lord. And that probably happens to you guys on a regular basis. Where God will say "Yes, I want to do this," and you have to return to the Lord. Any things come to mind that maybe God has prompted in you at various times as things you step out in faith and things go wrong, and then you have to return to the Lord and God has to renew His promise or His covenant with you? AL: I think everybody goes through that. PAUL: Definitely. AL: When you're going through it, your own self, you know, that's when you start looking at your faltering lips. At least I do. I want to quit, give up. I think Satan uses a lot of things, you know, to -- I mean, you know, get you to doubt God's word. Because that's actually to me, in the garden of Eden, that's where, you know, Satan attacked God's word, you know. He used people. And I think that as we -- God tells me things, you know, and then people around will attack that and use different people, even my wife, you know, or my kids, you know. And, you know, I'll lose heart and then I'll probably miss more blessings than I receive because of turning away, you know. ERIC: I can relate to those things about, you know, even having people speak words that then tear you down. And you go, "Man, there's no reason to go back. There's no reason to even get back up." RICH: Feel weak about it. You don't want to get back because you feel shameful about it, that you were really low and that there, and you should be improving yourself to get to a higher step in your life, believe it. DALE: We were reminded when we were over at your house that we had a men's group and when we started it, we had a big jump and things went real well. And the "encouraging" word of God was, "Well, we tried this before and it never lasts." And we just got that the other day, a guy said, "Never been able to last over two months." We looked at each other, we've been going on a year now. And sometimes you'll get that "encouraging" word. "Well, we tried that and it didn't work." And at times, you know, you feel like "Oh, man, maybe we ought to just throw in the towel. Well, I'm glad we didn't." ERIC: I think as you're talking about starting something and after a period of time it starts to go down and you start to wonder, that's sort of like a Wednesday. And this study tonight to me is like a Wednesday chapter for Moses and a Wednesday for us, too. When I started this whole study on Exodus, I said, "I love these first two chapters, these first two lessons in Exodus are just some of my favorite." We talked about those. And then there's some that come up here that are a little later in the study, and I'm like, "Well, these aren't really so exciting to me. These aren't as fun; it's not so much fun to talk about Wednesday." But it's on the Wednesday that we have to make our decision what we're going to do the rest of the week and whether we're going to redeem what's left of our time. And that hump day can really be the catapult to taking us back up again. RICH: Like a roller coaster. ERIC: Exactly. That's a choice that we have to make. It's the same whether it's a Bible study that's been going on for a while and starts to lag or drop or wonder what we're going to do next, or whether it's a marriage that you were really thrilled about and jumping into, or whether it's having kids and that first baby and then the diapers and the crying and everything starts. Whatever it might be, where you can jump in and step out full of faith and say, "Okay, God, I'm ready, I'm going to go do it." But you get to a point where you say, "Things are going against me, people are starting to talk and grumble." The Israelites are already mad at Moses, saying, "We're not listening to you anymore, you're not helping us, you're not rescuing us at all." Pharaoh, he's not helping the situation very much. Other people speaking into our lives, sometimes they'll say, "Why don't you just stop," like Job's wife. And that's when we need to get out some kind of reminder and say, "Okay, God." Return to the Lord. "Have you called me? Yes or no?" And these aren't things that I worship. [the grapefruit bag] These aren't things that I'd hang on my dashboard window like something I pray to. DALE: You're in trouble if you are. ERIC: That's right; that's not going to help too much, is it? To me it's like a wedding ring, and you have that on your finger to remind you of the covenant you made with your wife. And I heard a speaker one time say he'd never be able to commit adultery with his wedding ring on. He would have to physically take it off and set it next to him if he wanted to commit adultery, because of that covenant that he made with his wife. And therefore, he never takes his ring off. And it's a reminder, and they say this in the wedding service frequently. This is a reminder of the covenant you have made between you and your wife, that you will be with them forever. And sometimes we need those visual clues, those visual reminders. Maybe that's something you could do when God starts throwing you into situations where things are going against you. Maybe you can come up with some kind of visual reminder. What did God speak to you when you returned to Him? What did He say? What did He promise? And that will help carry you through that time. But the two things in the lesson tonight, God will help us with both battles, the battle of the faith and the battle of the flesh. And the other thing is that we have to choose whether we're going to accept His help or not. We have to choose like Moses had to choose. Was he going to take the next step and talk to Pharaoh or was he going to back off and be done. I say go forward. Don't let Wednesday get you down. Don't let the rest of your week drop; don't let the rest of your marriage drop; don't let the rest of your life drop. Return to the Lord and pick it up and start going up and up and up. Like Rich says, "You'll be on a roller coaster but man, it'll be the ride of your life." And you'll see as we keep going through Exodus, Moses had a wild ride, but God was with him. And God will be with us, too. Why don't we spend a little time worshipping God and just talk about God's faithfulness and how faithful He is to us forever and ever and ever. If you want to join us there in your home or in your office, we're just going to worship here on your screen and you can just worship right along with us. Sing it out. If you've got a guitar or keyboard or something you want to play with drums or just a couple pencils in your top desk drawer, that you just want to get out and join us here, make a joyful noise to the Lord. If you guys in the room want to stand up, we'll sing give thanks to the Lord, our God and King. (Worship song.)
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