Message 1: Encountering God’s Person

SUGGESTED PASSAGE: EXODUS 3:1-14 MESSAGE GOAL: The goal of this message is that you and your church, Now was pasturing the flock of Jethro his father-in-law, individually and collectively, will experience a life-transforming the priest of Midian; and he led the flock to the west side of divine encounter as we meet God at our burning bush. the wilderness and came to Horeb, the mountain of God. 2 The angel of the LORD appeared to him in a blazing fire from the midst of a bush; and he looked, and behold, the bush was INTRODUCTION: burning with fire, yet the bush was not consumed.3 So Moses Far too many Christians have a relationship with God that is said, “I must turn aside now and see this marvelous sight, why more like a flicker of a candle than the brilliance of the noonday the bush is not burned up.” 4 When the LORD saw that he turned sun. What we need is a fresh encounter, an experience with the aside to look, God called to him from the midst of the bush and Most High God. 5 said, “Moses, Moses!” And he said, “Here I am.” Then He said, One of the most famous encounters in Scripture is when Moses “Do not come near here; remove your sandals from your feet, meets God at the burning bush. Moses is eighty years old at 6 for the place on which you are standing is holy ground.” He this time. He has spent forty years in the court of Egypt as the said also, “I am the God of your father, the God of Abraham, the adopted son of Pharaoh and forty years in the wilderness as God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob.” Then Moses hid his face, for a lowly shepherd after killing an Egyptian slave master in a he was afraid to look at God. misguided attempt to liberate his people, the . 7 The LORD said, “I have surely seen the affliction of My people So, when we find Moses in Exodus 3, there is a forty-year who are in Egypt, and have given heed to their cry because of gap between his misstep and his encounter with God. He 8 their taskmasters, for I am aware of their sufferings. So I have has gone from the spotlight in Egypt to following sheep come down to deliver them from the power of the Egyptians, in a remote desert, a lowly profession in the biblical world. and to bring them up from that land to a good and spacious Life certainly had not worked out the way Moses must have land, to a land flowing with milk and honey, to the place of the thought it would. Canaanite and the Hittite and the Amorite and the Perizzite and the Hivite and the Jebusite. 9 Now, behold, the cry of the sons of Are you here today feeling like you are just leading sheep? Israel has come to Me; furthermore, I have seen the oppression That is, life is not working out like you had hoped it would. with which the Egyptians are oppressing them. Something happened years ago, and now you are wondering around behind sheep. If you could go back and change 10 Therefore, come now, and I will send you to Pharaoh, so that whatever happened to put you there, you would do it. But you 11 you may bring My people, the sons of Israel, out of Egypt.” But can’t, so you’re just leading sheep, doing the best you can with Moses said to God, “Who am I, that I should go to Pharaoh, and what you’ve got. that I should bring the sons of Israel out of Egypt?” 12 And He said, “Certainly I will be with you, and this shall be the sign to I have some good news for you today, particularly if you’re in you that it is I who have sent you: when you have brought the a wilderness with sheep. Even though it had been forty years, people out of Egypt, you shall worship God at this mountain.” God had not forgotten Moses. And He has not forgotten you, even though it may seem like it as you perform your routine 13 Then Moses said to God, “Behold, I am going to the sons of day-to-day tasks and watch the clock and the calendar go Israel, and I will say to them, ‘The God of your fathers has sent by. But the good news is that there is still hope for a fresh me to you.’ Now they may say to me, ‘What is His name?’ What encounter with God. shall I say to them?” 14 God said to Moses, “I AM WHO I AM”; and He said, “Thus you shall say to the sons of Israel, ‘I AM has sent me to you.’”

TonyEvans.org | LoisEvans.org SERMON POINTS: • Some people will never burn for God because they are 1. IF YOU WANT TO HAVE A DIVINE ENCOUNTER WITH wearing “evangelical asbestos suits.” GOD, YOU NEED TO HANG OUT WHERE HE IS. • People like this don’t want to get too close to God’s holy fire lest His spark catch them on fire. • A lot of people who say they want an experience with God • We have to deal with sin because many of us are too don’t want to hang out with where He is located. “Egyptianized.” We have too much of the world in us. • If you want to pursue God’s Person, you must be willing to • God doesn’t want to tell us His plan for lifting us to a new go into God’s presence. level in our Christian lives until we have had an encounter • As long as we insist on a long-distance relationship with with Him and dealt with the sin that is holding us back. God, that is precisely what we will have, but it will be absent a true encounter with Him. 4. IF YOU WANT A DIVINE ENCOUNTER WITH GOD, YOU MUST COME TO HIM ON HIS TERMS. 2. ONE WAY YOU KNOW YOU’RE ABOUT TO HAVE A DIVINE ENCOUNTER IS WHEN GOD PRESENTS YOU WITH • God is the personal, self-revealing God whose name is “I A CONTRADICTORY SITUATION. AM WHO I AM,” who sits outside of time in eternity. • This means that no matter how long you have been leading sheep, I AM can deal with your situation and • Throughout , we see contradictions occurring restore the years that have been lost if you will depend when God shows up—things that are not operating completely on Him. according to their normal flow. • This is why there is no room in the Christian life for the • Many of us have missed an encounter with God because pride that says, “I can do this myself.” we ignored His contradiction. • Having an authentic encounter with God doesn’t mean • If you are seeking God and something happens that your problems are over; you’ll still have to face your doesn’t make sense, don’t ignore it—turn aside and Pharaoh. investigate it further. • But when you face your Pharaoh, I AM is going to be your • The Bible says that when you respond to what God has power, your deliverer, your sustainer and your victory, done, He will give you more (Matthew 13:12). because “greater is He who is in you than he who is in the • It’s easy to talk about wanting a fresh encounter with God, world” (1 John 4:4). but He wants to see us turn aside and seek Him, not just talk about it. • If you will call out to God in the midst of your contradiction, He will answer because He responds to His name being called.

3. YOU CANNOT HAVE A DIVINE ENCOUNTER WITH GOD IF YOU ARE NOT WILLING TO DEAL WITH SIN.

• When you come into God’s presence, you are standing on holy ground. • Moses’ shoes represented the collective dirt of sin that has to be put aside before you can go any further in an encounter with a holy God.

TonyEvans.org | LoisEvans.org SERMON ILLUSTRATIONS: QUOTES BY DR. TONY EVANS: REMOVING SHOES FOR WORSHIP “A rhema word is an utterance with your name on it. The Perhaps you have seen pictures of the long lines of shoes question is, do you hear it as being for you? Do you hear God outside of a Muslim mosque. A person has to take his shoes calling your name in the wilderness that has been an extended off before he can enter the mosque because it is considered place for you? When God grabs your undivided attention, you’ll a holy place and the people coming in have been walking experience what we call in theology, God’s shekinah glory all over town collecting dirt on their shoes. But they are when He manifests Himself.” not allowed to bring that dirt into their place of worship. How much more should we who worship Yahweh treat His “People put on asbestos suits so they don’t catch fire. Some of presence as holy. us will never burn for God because we really don’t want to get that close to the fire. We’re satisfied with services, seminars, BACKGROUND BIBLICAL HISTORY AND CULTURE: programs and preaching, but we don’t want to catch fire. So, we put on our asbestos suits and our asbestos dresses, and we Exodus 3:1 says that Moses brought his flock “to the west come to church with our shoes on, and we wonder why we are side of the wilderness and came to Horeb, the mountain not encountering God.” of God.” “Horeb” is another name for , the place where Moses would later be given the Ten Commandments. Horeb is the place where God’s presence was manifested in a miraculous way and terrifying way (Hebrews 12:18-21).

TonyEvans.org | LoisEvans.org Message 2: Encountering the Power of God

SUGGESTED PASSAGE: Exodus 14:1-18 your staff and stretch out your hand over the sea and divide it, and the sons of Israel shall go through the midst of the sea Now the Lord spoke to Moses, saying, 2 “Tell the sons of Israel on dry land. 17 As for Me, behold, I will harden the hearts of to turn back and camp before Pi-hahiroth, between Migdol the Egyptians so that they will go in after them; and I will be and the sea; you shall camp in front of Baal-zephon, opposite it, honored through Pharaoh and all his army, through his by the sea. 3 For Pharaoh will say of the sons of Israel, ‘They are and his horsemen. 18 Then the Egyptians will know that I am wandering aimlessly in the land; the wilderness has shut them the Lord, when I am honored through Pharaoh, through his in.’ 4 Thus I will harden Pharaoh’s heart, and he will chase after chariots and his horsemen.” them; and I will be honored through Pharaoh and all his army, and the Egyptians will know that I am the Lord.” And they did so. MESSAGE GOAL: 5 When the king of Egypt was told that the people had fled, The goal of this message on Encountering the Power of God Pharaoh and his servants had a change of heart toward the is to show that God wants to encounter you, not merely by people, and they said, “What is this we have done, that we have the information you may learn about Him, but by personal let Israel go from serving us?” 6 So he made his ready experience in your daily Christian life. and took his people with him; 7 and he took six hundred select chariots, and all the other chariots of Egypt with officers over 8 INTRODUCTION: all of them. The Lord hardened the heart of Pharaoh, king of Egypt, and he chased after the sons of Israel as the sons of Israel After church one day, a mother asked her son, “What did were going out boldly. 9 Then the Egyptians chased after them you learn about in Sunday school today?” with all the horses and chariots of Pharaoh, his horsemen and The little boy said, “We learned about Israel crossing the his army, and they overtook them camping by the sea, beside .” Pi-hahiroth, in front of Baal-zephon. His mother asked, “What did the teacher say about Israel crossing the Red Sea?” 10 As Pharaoh drew near, the sons of Israel looked, and behold, The boy replied, “Well, it was like this. Israel built a bridge over the Egyptians were marching after them, and they became very the Red Sea. They got in buses and crossed over the bridge. 11 frightened; so the sons of Israel cried out to the Lord. Then Then when the Egyptians came after them, God sent some they said to Moses, “Is it because there were no graves in Egypt F-16 fighter jets and dropped bombs on them until they were that you have taken us away to die in the wilderness? Why all destroyed.” have you dealt with us in this way, bringing us out of Egypt? His mother looked skeptical. “Come on, now! Your teacher 12 Is this not the word that we spoke to you in Egypt, saying, couldn’t have explained Israel crossing the Red Sea like that,” ‘Leave us alone that we may serve the Egyptians’? For it would to which her son replied, “No, but if I told you how it really have been better for us to serve the Egyptians than to die in the happened, you’d never believe me!” wilderness.” Probably the most notable story and most celebrated 13 But Moses said to the people, “Do not fear! Stand by and in Israel’s history was the crossing of the Red Sea. But what I see the salvation of the Lord which He will accomplish for you want you to see today is that Israel had this incredible divine today; for the Egyptians whom you have seen today, you will encounter with God in the context of the greatest dilemma never see them again forever. 14 The Lord will fight for you while in their history—being trapped between the Red Sea and you keep silent.” Pharaoh’s army that had come to slaughter them. We’re talking about divine encounters in this brief series—how 15 Then the Lord said to Moses, “Why are you crying out to to encounter God by experience, not merely by information. Me? Tell the sons of Israel to go forward. 16 As for you, lift up

TonyEvans.org | LoisEvans.org You can go to church for years and never have an encounter, 3. WHEN YOU’RE TRAPPED IN A DILEMMA, YOU that is, a real, life-changing experience, with the living and true MUST APPEAL TO SOMEONE WHO HAS A SPIRITUAL God. Yet, God wants to have an encounter with you and me, PERSPECTIVE. both individually and collectively as His people. • Fear can lead you to blame the person who is most in SERMON POINTS: touch with God (Exodus 14:10-12). 1. WHEN YOU RUN INTO A REAL DILEMMA, GOD • The person with the right spiritual perspective on your COULD BE POSITIONING YOU FOR A LIFE-CHANGING situation may tell you, “Just be quiet, and watch God work” ENCOUNTER WITH HIM. (Exodus 14:13). • When we are fearful of circumstances that seem about to • Your dilemma may appear at first to be a no-win situation. engulf us, it’s time to quit talking and start trusting. No matter what direction you look in, you’re trapped. Your • Keeping silent and listening to the sound advice of godly back is against the wall. spiritual leaders puts you in a position of submitting to • A dilemma does not mean you are out of God’s will. He led legitimate spiritual authority, which pleases God. the Israelites the long way out of Egypt (Exodus 13:17- 18), deliberately putting them between the Red Sea and 4. FOCUS ON THE DIVINE DIRECTIONS, NOT THE Pharaoh’s army. HUMAN SITUATION. • When God leads you in what seems to be the long way in His will, His presence is going before you (Exodus 13:21). • When there is nothing you can do or should do in your • The Bible says the story of Israel’s deliverance at the dilemma, stand still! Red Sea is designed to give you hope for your Red Sea • When God says move forward, put feet to your faith experience (Romans 15:4; 1 Corinthians 10:1-6). (Exodus 14:14-15; Hebrews 11:29). • Until God sees faith, you won’t see God (Hebrews 11:6). 2. BUT BEFORE YOUR “RED SEA” DILEMMA GETS BETTER, IT MAY ACTUALLY GET WORSE. 5. GOD WILL PUT YOU IN A DILEMMA, EVEN WHEN YOU ARE IN HIS WILL, SO YOU CAN SEE SOMETHING. • God may be bringing you this dilemma to put you in a situation that only He can get you out of. • You may need to look at your dilemma in a different light, • Just because a situation turns left on you doesn’t mean the from God’s perspective. devil is behind it. • Get in the will of God so He can turn your dilemma into • God may send Pharaoh and his army after you so you something He can use. can see His deliverance in a way you would never see it • Begin walking by faith because you now have a bigger otherwise. view of the God who wants to show you His power that will • It’s easy to get confused when you’re trapped between the blow your mind. Red Sea and Pharaoh’s army. • At times like this, you may be calling out to God for deliverance and blaming other people for the mess you’re in at the same time.

TonyEvans.org | LoisEvans.org SERMON ILLUSTRATIONS: QUOTES BY DR. TONY EVANS: A WINDING ROUTE “Unless you understand and accept the sovereignty of God It’s frustrating when God doesn’t seem to know how to lead over your dilemma, you will be confused about what is you on a direct route! Instead, He takes you from point “A” to going on.” ‘F” and then back to “C,” only to bring you back to point “F” and wind up at point “X.” “Faith is in your feet, not in your feelings. I don’t care how ‘faith- ish”’ you feel, if your feet are not moving when God has given SPIRITUAL CUL-DE-SACS you instruction to move, you are faithless while feeling full of faith. On the other hand, you can feel no faith at all, but be full You know what a cul-de-sac is, a drive with only one way of faith because you are walking by faith, contradictory to your out—the way you came in. God led Israel into the worst cul- feelings of lack of faith.” de-sac of all time when He put them up against the Red Sea with Pharaoh’s army coming along the only way out. That’s called a trap. “A lot of people are waiting on God, when God is actually A lot of us believe God wouldn’t lead us into a trap. Oh, but waiting on us because while we are talking a good faith game, God does do that, because it is sometimes only in those our feet haven’t moved. We haven’t operated on what He has situations that we come to learn He is God. When God is ready told us to do.” to move you to a new spiritual experience with Him, He will regularly do it in the midst of a contradiction and a conflict. “When God is ready to give you a new experience with Him, He will allow you to be put into a situation that only He can get you out of. It doesn’t matter who you know, how much money you have, where you live or the car you drive. When God is ready to give you a new experience with Him, He will regularly put you in a situation you can’t handle so you will see Him work in a way you’ve never seen before.”

TonyEvans.org | LoisEvans.org Message 3: Encountering God’s Promise

SUGGESTED PASSAGE: Genesis 22:1-18 Lord, because you have done this thing and have not withheld your son, your only son, 17 indeed I will greatly bless you, and Now it came about after these things, that God tested I will greatly multiply your seed as the stars of the heavens Abraham, and said to him, “Abraham!” And he said, “Here I and as the sand which is on the seashore; and your seed shall am.” 2 He said, “Take now your son, your only son, whom you possess the gate of their enemies. 18 In your seed all the nations love, Isaac, and go to the land of Moriah, and offer him there of the earth shall be blessed, because you have obeyed My as a burnt offering on one of the mountains of which I will tell voice.” 19 So Abraham returned to his young men, and they you.” 3 So Abraham rose early in the morning and saddled his arose and went together to Beersheba; and Abraham lived at donkey, and took two of his young men with him and Isaac his Beersheba. son; and he split wood for the burnt offering, and arose and went to the place of which God had told him. 4 On the third day Abraham raised his eyes and saw the place from a distance. 5 MESSAGE GOAL: Abraham said to his young men, “Stay here with the donkey, The goal of this message on Encountering God’s Promise is to and I and the lad will go over there; and we will worship and help you experience an authentic encounter with God and His return to you.” 6 Abraham took the wood of the burnt offering promises through the tests of life He puts you through. and laid it on Isaac his son, and he took in his hand the fire and the knife. So the two of them walked on together. 7 Isaac spoke to Abraham his father and said, “My father!” And he said, “Here INTRODUCTION: I am, my son.” And he said, “Behold, the fire and the wood, but If the truth be told, there are times in our Christian experience where is the lamb for the burnt offering?” 8 Abraham said, “God when we don’t feel like God keeps His promises. There are will provide for Himself the lamb for the burnt offering, my son.” times when it looks like God said one thing and the opposite is So the two of them walked on together. taking place. It is during those times when all of us, to varying 9 Then they came to the place of which God had told him; and degrees, question how real this thing is. When it comes to God’s Abraham built the altar there and arranged the wood, and promises, we know He can’t lie, but sometimes you lied to you bound his son Isaac and laid him on the altar, on top of the because what He says and what you are seeing do not match. wood. 10 Abraham stretched out his hand and took the knife Sometimes it looks like God is bailing out on us. to slay his son. 11 But the angel of the Lord called to him from It’s like the pilot of a small plane that began having engine heaven and said, “Abraham, Abraham!” And he said, “Here I am.” problems. There was only one parachute on the plane. So, the 12 He said, “Do not stretch out your hand against the lad, and pilot put it on, and before he jumped out of the plans he said to do nothing to him; for now I know that you fear God, since you his passengers, “Don’t panic. I’m just going to get some help!” 13 have not withheld your son, your only son, from Me.” Then Sometimes it seems like the one in charge has bailed out on Abraham raised his eyes and looked, and behold, behind him you and on His promises. I want to take you today to a passage a ram caught in the thicket by his horns; and Abraham went of Scripture that is going to stretch you if you’re not familiar and took the ram and offered him up for a burnt offering in the with it. And even if you are, it’s going to perhaps take you 14 place of his son. Abraham called the name of that place The to a place of deeper understanding God and His seemingly Lord Will Provide, as it is said to this day, “In the mount of the confusing promises to you. Lord it will be provided.”

15 Then the angel of the Lord called to Abraham a second time from heaven, 16 and said, “By Myself I have sworn, declares the

TonyEvans.org | LoisEvans.org SERMON POINTS: • The Lord is called Jehovah Jireh in Genesis 22:14, meaning 1. WHEN GOD WANTS TO GIVE YOU AN ENCOUNTER “The Lord who provides.” But before God provides, He WITH HIMSELF, IT WILL TYPICALLY INVOLVE A TEST. wants to see our obedience. • If you don’t give God something to see, you may not see • God wants to know if what you “Amened” on Sunday is real what He can provide. in your life on Monday, because He wants to see and hear more than your raised hands and words. 4. GOD’S PROMISES ARE CONFIRMED BY HIS OATH. • Tests come in many shapes and sizes, and they are often related to a promise, to find out if you will put your faith in • It’s important to understand that there is often a lapse God’s promises into action. of time between the giving of God’s promise and its fulfillment. 2. YOUR TEST WILL OFTEN INVOLVE A SCENARIO THAT IS • This time gap occurs because God is getting His promise CONTRADICTORY—THAT DOESN’T MAKE SENSE. ready for you, and getting you ready for His promise. • You have a part to play in how long this preparation period lasts, based on your obedience. • God may be asking you to do something that seems to go • God is a promise-keeper, not a promise-breaker, and when against everything that seems right and normal to you, He makes an oath, He has the power to pull off the promise and everything in you is fighting against obeying Him. all by Himself. • When God calls you to do something you don’t want to • It is not for you to try and understand how God is going do, go ahead and do it because the longer you delay your to keep His promise. All you’ve got to do is finish your obedience, the more often you have to take the same test. obedience until He is ready to take it over Himself. • We often give God partial obedience and then wonder why He hasn’t done anything for us. • To experience a truly life-changing encounter with God, 5. ABRAHAM’S STORY IS IN SCRIPTURE BECAUSE GOD you have to finish what He told you to do in your test WANTS TO USE SOMETHING TODAY BASED ON THE because God believes in re-testing when necessary! PRINCIPLE HE HAS TAUGHT US FROM YESTERDAY. • When God’s test doesn’t make sense, you need a bigger view of God and what He wants to do in your life. • God uses tests to bring about His promises through His • One way to get this bigger view is to remember what God oath. did for you yesterday as you deal with the new test He is • You need to make sure you are passing God’s test so you sending you today. can see God’s promises fulfilled in your life.

3. THE REASON GOD PUTS YOU IN A TRIAL THAT DOESN’T MAKE SENSE IS THAT HE WANTS TO FEEL YOUR LOVE, NOT JUST HEAR YOU TALK ABOUT HOW MUCH YOU LOVE HIM.

• God feels your love for Him when, in obedience, you choose Him over something or somebody you already love, as Abraham did. • You will see the resolution of your test and see God’s promise come to fruition when your obedience occurs.

TonyEvans.org | LoisEvans.org SERMON ILLUSTRATIONS: QUOTES BY DR. TONY EVANS: QUIZZES AND BIG TESTS “Everybody feels like going to church when you’re blessed. When we were in school, the teacher did not take our word Everybody feels like worshiping God when God is meeting for it that we understood what was being taught. Instead, the all your needs, and He’s going to take care of everything. The teacher gave you tests to see if you really got the material. money is flowing, the health is good and life is working. Then Those tests usually came in two forms. One would be a quiz, you want to worship. But how do you worship when your or maybe a pop quiz. Those were small tests along the way. world is falling apart?” But then there were the big tests—the mid-term and the final. Those big tests usually counted the most toward your final “When God puts you in a contradiction, you can’t explain how grade. Genesis 22 was one of the big tests for Abraham. it’s going to work out. When God wants you to give you an encounter with Himself, all you can say is, ‘I don’t know what to do.’ God has to provide something. God has to come through PUT A FORK IN IT with something.” Good cooks know that a turkey or a roast in the oven can look brown on the outside. But you can’t take that as gospel “Many of us could be delaying seeing the provision of the ram, because the meat may still be partially uncooked on the the solution to our test, because we are delaying fulfilling our inside. So the cook sticks a fork in the dish because the cook obedience.” knows it can look good externally and still be raw inside. God knows His people can look good externally on Sunday morning, but He has to stick the fork of a test in there to see if we’re well-done and ready to go.

BACKGROUND BIBLICAL HISTORY AND CULTURE: The place where Abraham offered Isaac is called Mount Moriah, which is the temple mount in Jerusalem where the two temples of Israel were built and where the Muslim Dome of the Rock stands today. The temple mount is the most sacred site in Judaism, and Muslims consider it holy too because the Qur’an teaches that Abraham offered Ishmael there, not Isaac.

TonyEvans.org | LoisEvans.org