Exodus 15 Lesson # 12
Building a Future With Praise
I. Greetings:
II. Introduction:
Note: Christians have always sung, so did the Jewish people. Today we are going to look at “singing” and why we do it.
Note: I remember reading a portion of the Psalms when I was a child and the Psalm said something to the effect: “I love you with all my being”. I knew then that I was a Christian, but I did not love God with all my being. I then thought of some of the hymns we sung at church, and I knew that I could not honestly sing some of them. I knew I had no right to sing the words of many of those songs. However, there were times when I could honestly sing the songs….
Q Have you ever felt the love of God so intensely that you could sing the songs because they were truly what you felt?
Q Should we only sing when we can feel it?
An = Oswald Chambers strikes a balance between two words: honest and offering: 1) If we sing and are phony then it is so much humbug. We all know religious phonies and deeply dislike such behavior, and the Bible agrees, but… 2) If we sing only when we feel like it, then that cheapens when we do sing, for it is then only undisciplined expression. What if our parents only feed us when they felt warm fuzzies towards us? None of us would be here! When we sing praise to God we can offer it as a sacrifice, then the very statements we make can free us (Oswald Chambers, The Best From All His Works, p. 243).
Note: So, we need to be honest and not lose our integrity, but also we need to be willing to offer to God a sacrifice of praise, an offering.
Note: In chapter 14 of Exodus Israel just experienced a mighty military deliverance in the crossing of the Red Sea. Egypt’s mighty army had just been stopped from destroying Israel with all her chariots. Their enemies had all been drowned!
When Israel was delivered by God, they sang a song of praise.
III. Israel Praises God: Exodus 15:1-18.
A. The Opening Reframe: Exodus 15:1
>>>> Have someone read Exodus 15:1.
Q How many sang this song we are going to read?
An = Moses and all of Israel. It was congregational singing.
Q To whom did they sing according to 15:1?
An = “to the Lord”.
Note: As we read this song you will notice that Israel does not celebrate their faith in God, but God Himself. A lot of people want to talk about keeping or preserving “the faith” but here Israel wants to sing, not about her faithfulness, but God’s. They experienced God as an active force and power in their lives. Had He not acted they would not be there.
Q According to verse 1 why did they sing?
An = Two reasons: 1) Because it is “meet and right to do so”, because He is God, because He is highly exalted. It is just appropriate to praise Him. He is the Creator of the earth, the Mighty One, unending in power and majesty, or simply: “He is highly exalted”. 2) God just saved them from a tough situation. They experienced in their own lives a specific blessing. They had just been saved. They had been saved from a specific enemy: the Egyptians.
Note: If God has really done something for you then you can sing! The words of this song are good theology. Good theology comes from experiencing God in a tangible way.
Q Why is important that God has acted in our personal lives?
An = If He has, then we can sing. Chambers also says if we have not received, then we will not understand. Israel has received, but she wants to sing of more than her experience of God’s goodness, she wants to sing of God’s character as well.
B. A Hymn to Yahweh: Who is Yahweh? Exodus 15:2-3
Note: Remember when Pharaoh said: “Who is the Lord, that I should let Israel go?” (Exodus 5:2)? Well, now Israel wants to speak about who the Lord is.
>>>> Have someone read Exodus 15:2-3.
Q How many times is the word “my” is used in verse 2?
An = The NIV has five times, in Hebrew and some other translations it is found four times, and the fifth is certainly implied.
Q What does the repeated use of this pronoun mean?
An = He is a personal God, Israel’s God, their God. He is not just God in general but their personal God. That is what the old phrase accepting Jesus “as personal Lord and Savior” means. He works in our lives, in our history. He our God? We can know that He is our strength, our salvation, our God, and that those who went before us worshipped.
Q Can we afford to be honest if we do not feel God has redeemed us?
An = I think we can, and I can tell you today, you and I can experience Him in a powerful way in our lives in the coming year that can cause us to sing.
Q What else so they sing about God in 15:3?
An = He is a warrior and His great Name is now proclaimed in their song.
Q What does it mean to you God is a warrior?
Note: Israel is not celebrating her faith, because she did not have faith, she was busy gripping just before the Sea was opened (14:11-12). It was God who saved her, not she herself. He fought for her.
C. Alternating Specific Praise with General Praise. Exodus 15:4-10.
Note: What follows is a typical expression found through out the Old Testament. Israel’s personal experience of one particular deliverance leads her to praise God in general. The rest of the song will alternate, deliberately from praise to what God did at the Sea to who God is. The pattern dominates this song (as it done in other places in the O.T.): General praise: 1 c , 6-7, 11-13, 18, 21 a. Specific praise for the victory at the Sea: 1d, 4-5, 8-10, 14-17, 21 b.
>>>> Have someone read Exodus 15:4-7.
Q Where are the breaks? What verses are specific praise for Sea victory and what verses are general praise of God’s character?
An = In verses 4-5 the destruction of Pharaoh’s army is sung about. In verses 6-7 God’s majesty and power are celebrated.
>>>> Have someone read Exodus 15:8-10
Q What do you think of such words as “Thy nostrils” “blow with Thy wind”? What is this? Does God have nostrils?
An = Israel is speaking in metaphor. We call such phrases anthropomorphisms. Sometimes we can say more in metaphor than we can in normal speech. Israel was quite aware God was something beyond having nostrils. By using metaphor Israel was able to discuss the greater issues of life because normal speech could not address them. Such speech also could bring home some spiritual truths that go beyond the physical references. For example, in verses 8-10 Israel reviews the piling up of the waters, as the piling of up Egypt’s arrogance, and then in verse 10 their destruction in the Sea as it collapsed around them.
Q Does it bother you that “blast of His nostrils” and in verse 7 God has “burning anger”? Is it embarrassing that God loses His temper?
An = Not to Israel! She watched the “wrath of God” and was glad! If God is not angry at the oppression of slaves and the death of the children of slaves then He is not the God the Bible knows. God hates oppression and in anger will judge it.
Q What does that means for us?
An = 1) If we are abusing our power at work, in our marriage, in our home, then we will meet God. It is good to figure out what angers God and avoid it. He is quite reasonable and quite clear about what He wants.
2) If you are here today and have been abused, remember it is not your faith in God, but God Himself that will help you. Your faith may be too weak, you will need faith in the future, but right now all you need to do is ask for help.
D. The Lord’s Incomparability. Exodus 15:11-13.
Note: The song now takes another turn and goes back to speaking about God in general.
>>>> Have someone read Exodus 15:11-13.
Q What is the focus of the rhetorical questions in verse 11?
An = The rhetorical questions center on Yahweh’s incomparability. “Who is like Him”. Who is like Him in majestic holiness, awesome in praise, and in wonder working power? God wants us to praise Him not because He is hungary for acceptance or needs to constantly take a “bow”, but because it is “right and meet to do so”. When we praise we are reconnected to reality. He is to be praised because of who He is.
Q Notice a change takes place in verse 13, what is it?
An = No longer is the past celebrated but now the future. God is not just going to save us, but lead us.
Q Where will God lead us?
An = I, like many of you, struggle to know what God wants me to do in the future. He will guide, often specifically, but most of all He guides us to Himself. It does not matter if I know where I am to go, as long as it is with Him to His holy abode.
E. Praise for Future Guidance. Exodus 15:14-18.
Note: God wants to give us more than we even know we should ask for. We often misunderstand this but God desires to bless us.
>>>> Have someone read Exodus 15:14-18.
Q What new things is God going to do in the future?
An = Israel had gotten free from Egypt but now she needed to be guided to the promise land. She had been delivered from Egypt’s armies but if she wanted true freedom there were a lot more armies to face. Before she even knew they were out there God was already starting the process of freeing her from them. He was already working on future problems.
IV. Application: Exodus 15:19-21.
Q How do we grow in our faith? How many of you want to grow?
An I believe you want to grow in your faith or you would not be here right now. I too wish to grow. Exodus 15 tells us a couple of things about how to do that.
1) Praise God for the good things He has done. Praising God for the past blessings begins our opening up to His future blessings. So often I get to preoccupied with the present and forget the past blessings, and then I am not aware that there is a future, and it is in God’s hands.
2) If you feel farther from God than you want to be then, offer praise to Him whether you feel it or not. Not because you feel it, but because you know what you sing is true, it is appropriate. When you sing in the next service, sing the words as an offering to God and watch what will happen to you.
3) If you are burdened from what is happening to you and has happened to you in your past, then know that the Lord is a warrior. If you have been hurt, cry out to Him. It is OK to be honest and tell God He has not yet saved you. He can handle your telling Him the truth.
4) If we sing others will be helped. If we sing others will join, others, including those coming up in the future or who are younger than we are will be blessed. Our song will become blessings for coming generations.
>>>> Have someone read Exodus 15:19-21.
Note: Miriam rose up and took the matter further. She added music and celebration on a another plain. They sing the same song (21) for the same reason (19) but only now it is richer. If we praise God, others will expand the music.