Via Video, We're Going to Meet a Young Man This Morning

Moses Page 1 of 11 July 8, 2013 “There’s No Excuse for Excuses” Jeff Ginn, Senior Pastor Via video, we’re going to meet a young man this morning that’s quite remarkable. He has all the reasons in the world to make excuses for why he can’t do certain things, but his mother taught him early on never to make excuses, that he could do whatever God called him to do. His name is Ben Underwood. Watch this. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y_k8Wgor1FE That’s a great story because he made no excuses for himself, and you’ve got to give a lot of credit to his mother because boy, she did not shelter him. She put him out there and said, “Son, you can do anything you set your mind to.” He rose to it. He didn’t make any excuses. Now I don’t show that because we’re all like him. In fact, I’m showing it for the opposite reason. Too often, we though able bodied and having all of our senses, make excuses why we can’t do what God calls us to do, what he would will for us to do. So this morning, I want to preach a message entitled, “There’s no excuse for excuses.” There’s no excuse for excuses. And I want to base it out of the life of Moses. So if you’ll open your bible, please, to Exodus Chapter 3, we’re going to begin there. In fact, we’re going to Chapters 3 and 4. So keep your bible open. I’m only going to read two verses, and I would like you in the honor of God’s word to please stand. I’ll read these two verses, but then we’ll make our way through the two chapters over the course of the next few moments. God’s word says, “Come, I will send you to Pharaoh, that you may bring my people, the children of Israel, out of Egypt. But Moses said to God, “May it be as you have spoken, my Lord.” Is that what he said? No, that’s not what he said. Moses said to God, “Sir, yes sir.” Is that what it says? No. Moses said, “Your wish is my command.” No. He could have even used Chik-Fil-A’s response when you go through the line, you know, when you order your food. What do they always say at Chik-Fil-A? My pleasure. Moses doesn’t say any of those things. When God says, “Moses, I want you to go and rescue my people from Egypt,” here is what Moses said.” “Who am I that I should go to Pharaoh and bring the children out of Egypt?” Now begins Moses’ argument with God in which he offers up four excuses as to why he can’t obey. I want to think with you on this theme. There’s no excuse for excuses. Let’s pray. God, we thank you that you call us, that you empower us beyond the calling. There’s no reason we can’t do and become all that you will for us to do and be. And so I pray that this morning, you would dash to pieces any excuse that we’re offering up so that we can be found obedient, and I pray it in Jesus’ name, amen. This morning, we’re going to take a journey with Moses, and it’s a journey on the road to obedience. But it’s a long road that Moses walks to get to obedience, and it begins with what I’m going to call orders from the Lord. www.istrouma.org Page 1 of 11 Moses Page 2 of 11 July 8, 2013 “There’s No Excuse for Excuses” Jeff Ginn, Senior Pastor Orders from the Lord. You see, when Jesus comes to live in your heart, he doesn’t just come to be resident. He comes to be president. He doesn’t come to take sides. He comes to take over. He is Lord, and he has every right to have expectations of us and to issue orders to us, his servants. And so he does in the case of Moses. He has an order that he’s going to give Moses, and you see it here again in Verse 10. Come, I will send you to Pharaoh that you may bring my people, the children of Israel, out of Egypt. Now there are a couple of things that come to mind when you read this order that Moses received. The first thing is, as I read it, the enormity of this task. Now you think about it. Here is Moses. On the backside of the desert. All he has is a staff in his hand, no army, no munitions, no air force, no marines. Yet he is told to go into the most powerful figure on the planet and take from him his two million-member slave force. This is an enormous order that the Lord is giving you. You almost can excuse Moses for offering up excuses because this is intimidating, to say the least. It’s an enormous task. I’ve watched with amusement, you might say, as God across the scriptures gives enormous tasks to his people. I think of Gideon in the Old Testament. Many of you will remember that bible character. He was from the least of the tribes in Israel. He was the least in his clan in that least of all the tribes. Yet, God comes to him and says, “Gideon, I want you to liberate my people,” and he takes a force of 300 and goes against tens of thousands, and ultimately is given the victory. It was an enormous task. You think about little David, the shepherd boy, going up against Goliath, that behemoth of a fellow, and all of the Philistine army behind him, and with the slingshot and some stones, Gideon by God’s grace wins the day. It’s an enormous task. I’ve thought about the disciples in the New Testament. There was an occasion where Jesus was teaching, and the people love to hear Jesus teach. Jesus was not a boring bible teacher, and God forbid that we who teach the bible be boring. There’s nothing that I abhor more and pray that God would help me not to be boring, but instead to be like Jesus. They love to hear Jesus teach. And they were there by the thousands. In fact, there were 5,000 men. They didn’t even count the women and children, so there must have been many, many thousands. And the day wore on, yet still they lingered to hear him teach. And the disciples began to be alarmed. They said, “Lord, this is a remote region. There’s no McDonalds nearby. There’s no Outback. What are we going to do?” Jesus said, “You give them to eat.” Here are the apostles, there’s no bakery nearby, no grocery store, and yet he gives them an enormous task. Feed my sheep. And so the Lord gives an enormous task, and I’m going to hasten to say we’re not the exception. We have been given by God an enormous task. Here it is in Jesus’ own words. “Go ye therefore and make disciples of all the nations.” Here’s the way we say it at Istrouma. Here’s our mission statement. We glorify God by making disciples of all the nations. Then that is a huge – that is an enormous task that the Lord has laid upon us, www.istrouma.org Page 2 of 11 Moses Page 3 of 11 July 8, 2013 “There’s No Excuse for Excuses” Jeff Ginn, Senior Pastor and it would be hopeless were it not for the second thing I want to say about these orders, and that is with the order came empowerment for the task. God is going to empower Moses to do the very thing he’s calling him to do. There’s an old saying. God’s commandments are his enablements. God’s commands are his enablements. That is if he commands you to do something, you know he is going to empower you to do that very thing he commanded. And so it was with Moses. If you read the verses that lead up to this command, in them, beginning of Verse 7 of Chapter 3, God says, “I have surely seen the affliction of my people who are in Egypt. I’ve heard their cry because of their taskmasters. I know their sufferings, and I have come down to deliver them.” We looked at this last week. Before God says, “Moses, you go,” he says, “I have come,” and we have the Lord resident in us, empowering us to do the things he’s commanding us to do, to live a holy life, to be forgiving, to be a witness. Things that we find impossible. In him, we’re empowered to do. There’s a commercial that maybe you’ve seen that I like very much. It’s a commercial for Hyundai motors, and I want you to watch this. There’s a little lesson I want you to pick up. I like that. Touch, tackle. I got my team with me. I am ready. And for Moses, Moses is told, “Go rescue my people from Israel.” This would be way too great a responsibility, way too great a task for Moses in his own flesh, in his own resources, but Jesus said, “I have come down to deliver my people.

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