Hello Darkness, My Old Friend

Hello Darkness, My Old Friend

A three-year old boy was visiting his aunt overnight and he begged for the hall light to be left on and his bedroom door ajar when he went to bed. His aunt reminded him that he wasn’t afraid of the dark at home and he responded, “Yes, but there it’s my dark.”

How many people have ever been afraid of the dark? I didn’t look this up, but I would suspect that most younger kids, maybe ages ten and below, are afraid of the dark at one time or the other. I remember a time during those ages that I was afraid of the dark. I would get a running start up the stairs or make sure that I turned on certain lights to illuminate the darkest spaces in my house. As a teenager, I became comfortable in the dark, as I worked as a janitor in our church, and it got pretty dark there during the winter evenings. Then after graduating from high school, I worked from 11:00 pm to 7:00 am doing security for office buildings. We would never turn on all the lights, so I became comfortable in the dark. It kind of became my friend and not a place of fear, even when I was working alone. There was also a point where I came to trust the Lord to go before me and protect me from the dark or whatever fears I may have been experiencing.

We all have fears. The world is a dangerous place, and we can be so afraid that it can become debilitating. But the one constant is the presence of the Lord. Without the presence of the Lord in our lives we would not be able to stand up against the fears that Satan would throw against us. Darkness, or any other fear, can’t debilitate us because with the presence of the Lord in our lives, we make them our old friends. Am I still afraid of certain things? Like snakes and flying? Yes, but I know that if I had to fly or came across a snake, that I could turn to the Lord, in those times and my fear would lessen. The presence of the Lord makes the dark my dark and can make the dark your dark as well.

This morning, we are finishing up the Book of the Covenant. God has set before His people a long list of laws that he demands they obey, as their covenant God. He has redeemed them, saved them, and as they are on the precipice of the Promised Land, obedience is key. He gave them His law, now He will give them His presence. In our scripture this morning, God will send His special presence to be with them to guide and protect them, He will bless them as they worship Him and Him alone, and He will establish them in their Promised Place. But they aren’t going to be allowed to just sit back and watch it happen. In order for this to take place, God demanded that the Israelites give him their absolute and undying loyalty and obedience. The same is true for His people today. We are on the same journey as the Israelites. They were saved from slavery to Pharaoh. We have been saved from slavery to sin. They are on the way to their Promised Land. We are on our way to our eternal promised land, heaven. And as we journey on this earth, God has sent His special presence to be with us and to guide and protect us, He blesses us as we worship Him and Him alone and he has established a promised place for us in heaven. And while we are on this earth, in the process of sanctification or becoming more like Jesus, we are also called to an absolute, undying loyalty and obedience in and to the Lord. That brings us to our big idea this morning: God demands absolute, undying loyalty and obedience from His people.

Let’s pray: Heavenly Father, we thank you for this day, your day that you have made. Help us to rejoice and be glad in it. Pour out your Holy Spirit on us as we learn from your Word. Show us what you want each of us to know and share with others. Let our words, actions and thoughts honor and glorify you during this time. In Jesus’ name, Amen.

Our first point is, Presence, found in Exodus 23:20-23. This is what God’s Word says, “See, I am sending an angel ahead of you to guard you along the way and to bring you to the place I have prepared. Pay attention to him and listen to what he says. Do not rebel against him; he will not forgive your rebellion, since my Name is in him. If you listen carefully to what he says and do all that I say, I will be an enemy to your enemies and will oppose those who oppose you. My angel will go ahead of you and bring you into the land of the Amorites, Hittites, Perizzites, Canaanites, Hivites and Jebusites, and I will wipe them out.”

After setting all the laws before His people in the past two chapters, we would expect to see the Lord state an expectation of obedience to all the laws he commanded. But he doesn’t. Instead, he states he is going to provide an angel for them, and they would be expected to obey this angel he is sending to them. Before we talk about who the angel is, let’s talk about the angel’s role. The angel is to go ahead of the people to guard them along the way as he brings them to the place he has prepared for them. What is this place God has prepared for them? It is the Promised Land, the land of Canaan, promised to their forefathers.

What else do we learn about the angel from this passage? The angel has authority from God to command them. They are to pay attention to him, listen to what he says. The angel also has authority to forgive or not forgive their sins. They’re not to rebel against him and if they do, the angel will not forgive their rebellion. Also, God’s name is in the angel. God’s name is the very essence of who God is. It includes His character and attributes. They are to listen to what the angel says and do all that God says. This means that the words of the angel are the very words of God. If they are obedient to the commands of the angel, God promises to protect his covenant people from their enemies. The enemies of God’s people will become the enemies of God himself. The last thing we learn here about this angel is that he will wipe out those in the Promised Land that have come under God’s judgment for their sin and rebellion against Him. This angel is a warrior angel who will wipe out all the nations living in the Promised Land. They would no longer be counted among the nations of the earth. The list of six peoples occupying the Promised Land is not exhaustive but means that every nation in the Promised Land will be wiped out to make way for God’s chosen people. ​​ 

Now that we’ve talked about what the angel is going to do, let’s talk about who the angel is. There are five possibilities put forth by the commentators. One, it could be the pillar of cloud and fire that has been leading them ever since they entered the wilderness. Two, it could just be a metaphor for the Lord’s guidance. Three, it could be a human being such as Moses or Joshua. Four, it could be an actual angel like Michael or Gabriel. Lastly, it could be the pre-incarnate Christ. When we take into account all the angel will do and how closely he is connected to God, I believe that the angel is the second person of the Trinity, the pre-incarnate Christ. Christ can forgive or not forgive sins, Christ is the very essence of God, with the same character and attributes. Jesus and the Father are one. The words of Jesus are the very words of God. We have already seen the pre-incarnate Christ at the burning bush. The pre-incarnate Christ was going to be with them, go ahead of them, guide and protect them and would deliver them to the Promised Land. They didn’t need to be afraid of anything along the way because God was with them. God made the dark their dark. They needed to pay attention to the angel, listen to the angel and obey the angel just as they would to God. He demanded absolute, undying loyalty and obedience from His people. (Big Idea).

That leads us to our second point, Promise, found in Exodus 23:24-30. This is what God’s Word says, “Do not bow down before their gods or worship them or follow their practices. You must demolish them and break their sacred stones to pieces. Worship the Lord your God, and his blessing will be on your food and water. I will take away sickness from among you, and none will miscarry or be barren in your land. I will give you a full life span. “I will send my terror ahead of you and throw into confusion every nation you encounter. I will make all your enemies turn their backs and run. I will send the hornet ahead of you to drive the Hivites, Canaanites and Hittites out of your way. But I will not drive them out in a single year, because the land would become desolate and the wild animals too numerous for you. Little by little I will drive them out before you, until you have increased enough to take possession of the land.”

We have seen over and over and over again what God wanted from His people. And we’ve seen that God knew what sin would plague His people in the Promised Land. Last week, I said we can know what is important to God by what he reiterates to His people and what is important to God should be important to us. He again warns them to not bow down before the Canaanite gods, to not worship them or follow their practices. God knew that the gods of the Canaanites would be enticing to the Israelites, so he warned them again. But he commanded them to do more than just abstain from bowing down, worshiping or following their practices. He demanded that they take an active role by demolishing the Canaanite gods and sacred stones. The Canaanites would set up stone monuments to their gods and would worship them and the Israelites were to completely destroy all symbols of pagan worship. This was so the Israelites would not be tempted to worship them. We have the same things in our culture today and even in our own lives that we need to demolish and break into pieces. What are the idols in your heart and in my heart that competes with God for our affections, our hearts, our time, our resources, our attention, and our love? The Lord demands our absolute, undying loyalty and obedience (Big Idea) and that means we must destroy all idols and sacred stones in our lives. That brings us to our first next step on the back of your communication card: Destroy the idols and sacred stones in my life that keep me from worshiping the one true God.

After warning them what not to worship, the Lord tells them who they are to worship. They are to worship Him, the Lord their God. Then he made covenant promises to them. If they would worship Him and Him alone, the Lord promised that His blessing would be on their food and water. He promised to take away sickness from among them. He promised that their women wouldn’t miscarry or be barren. And he promised them a full life span. These were essentially the same promises of blessing that God gave to Abraham in Genesis 12. These were also covenant promises meaning that if the Israelites kept the covenant, the Lord would keep these covenant promises that he just made to them. But if they didn’t keep the covenant, then the covenant promises would be forfeited. The same covenant promises would turn into covenant curses because of the people’s disobedience as we saw in Deuteronomy 28:1-15 that Jackie read for us.

After making covenant promises that affected the people and their well-being, he goes on to make covenant promises that would affect the Promised Land that he was giving to them. The Lord would send His terror and His hornet ahead of them into the Promised Land to confuse the enemy nations they would encounter. Their enemies would “turn their backs and run” and be driven from the land, out of their way. The Lord’s “terror” and “hornet” could be the angel He is sending ahead of them, or it could have been the Lord himself confusing their enemies as he did to the Egyptian army at the Red Sea. “Terror” refers to the dread that would overwhelm the Canaanites when they realized the Lord was fighting for the Israelites. “Hornets” refers to the fear and panic that would ensue. Think about what it would look like to see a group of people being attacked by a hive of angry hornets. That’s the picture.

The phrase “turn their backs and run” could mean that as the Israelites were coming into the Promised Land all they would see are the backs of their enemies running away from them in terror. Or another translation could be that the Israelites have their enemies by the neck meaning their enemies are in total submission to them implying total victory over them. Then the Lord explains to them how he will drive the Canaanites out. It will not happen immediately upon their arrival or even in a single year but little by little. There were a couple of reasons for this. First, if he drove all the Canaanite peoples out immediately upon their arrival the land would be desolate and wild animals would become too numerous for them. The last count we had of the Israelites was somewhere around one to two million people. The land that God was giving to them was about 1.2 million square miles which would be equivalent to the areas of Alaska, Texas and California. In 2010 it was estimated that 63 million people lived in those three states. If all of a sudden, those 63 million people were gone and replaced by 2 million people, it would become a desolate place, and wild animals would be roaming around. So, until the Israelites could grow in population it made perfect sense for God to drive the Canaanite peoples out little by little. This didn’t negate the promise that God had made to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, it just made the land more effective for God’s chosen people. The Canaanite people would still be judged and still be driven out, it would just be done so the land promised to them would be healthy when they took full possession of it

That leads us to our third point, Place, found in Exodus 23:31-33. This is what God’s Word says, “I will establish your borders from the Red Sea to the Mediterranean Sea, and from the desert to the Euphrates River. I will give into your hands the people who live in the land, and you will drive them out before you. Do not make a covenant with them or with their gods. Do not let them live in your land or they will cause you to sin against me, because the worship of their gods will certainly be a snare to you.”

God has promised that his presence would be with His people and go ahead of them. He made covenant promises to them about their bodily health and the health of the land they would be inhabiting, as long as they kept their end of the covenant. Now, the Lord speaks to them about the specific place they would be inhabiting. He begins by spelling out the borders of the Promised Land he was giving them. Their land would stretch from the Red Sea in the south to the Mediterranean Sea in the west and from the desert in the east to the Euphrates River in the north. Then we see again that taking possession of the Promised Land meant taking action on their part. The Lord would give the people into the hands of the Israelites, and they would drive the Canaanites out before them. If they were obedient to the Lord this would be a simple process. If they weren’t obedient, it would be difficult to impossible.

Then the Lord closes the Book of the Covenant commanding them to not do certain things and tells them why they needed to obey these specific commands. First, they were to not make any covenants with the Canaanite peoples or their gods. In Middle Eastern culture when a covenant was made, the names of their gods were invoked as part of ratifying the covenant. If you remember last week, God commanded them to not invoke the names of other gods and to not let them be heard on their lips. We now see the reason why that command was important. If they were tempted to make a covenant with the people in the land, which they were commanded not to do, God had already commanded them against what would take place in making that treaty. God set these laws, these checks and balances before them, so that His people would live holy lives with absolute, undying loyalty and obedience to their covenant King. (Big Idea)

Second, they were not to let them live in their land. In Deuteronomy 20, they were to destroy every man, woman, child and animal as they went into the Promised Land. We may wonder why this was needed. It was because if they didn’t, the temptation to become like them instead of becoming more like their covenant King would be overwhelming and would cause them to sin against the Lord. They would worship the gods of the Canaanites instead of the one true God. God made us with what I call a God-shaped hole in our hearts. He made us to worship Him and if we decide not to worship God, it is guaranteed that we will worship something or someone else. This is why God warned them again and again and again against worshiping other gods. He knew that he made them to worship and by giving them the choice invariably many would choose other gods besides Himself. These other gods would be a snare or trap to God’s people. The Hebrew word for “snare” means not just falling into sin but falling into destruction. God knew that getting caught in the “snare or trap” of these false gods meant their destruction.

This is why our big idea is so important. If we aren’t as jealous for our God as he is for us, we will be tempted to follow after and worship every other god in the world. If we aren’t daily diligently seeking after the Lord, if we aren’t serious about our absolute and undying loyalty and obedience to the Lord, we will not only be tempted but will lose out to that temptation and sin every time. If we are not careful it can lead to our destruction. That brings us to our second next step on the back of your communication card: Not allow the gods of this world to be a snare to me in worshiping the one true God.

If we destroy the idols in our lives and if we don’t allow the gods of this world to ensnare us, we can fulfill our purpose to serve and worship the one true God. But we need to go deeper than that; we must be on guard daily against the attacks of the enemy. We must desperately want complete victory and not be satisfied with a partial victory. God adopted a zero-tolerance policy toward the Canaanites and their gods, and we must do the same with the gods of this world today. We can’t settle for a partial victory that stops short of our absolute, undying loyalty and obedience to Christ. (Big Idea) We may be tempted to think a little exposure to sin won’t harm us. It’s ok to look at a little pornography. Or it’s ok to have premarital sex. Or it’s ok to get a little drunk once in a while. Or it’s ok to cut corners at work sometimes. Or it’s ok to gossip or tell a little white lie when I have to. These little compromises trap us as Christians and before we know it we are indulging in bigger and bigger sins that can lead us to destruction.

When it comes to sin, we must adopt a no compromise and a zero-tolerance policy. We must tear down and destroy all temptation in our lives. That may mean not going to certain places, not being with certain friends, not entertaining certain ideas, conversations or desires. If we claim to follow Jesus Christ, we need to get rid of anything and everything that can become a snare or trap for us. Here are some questions every one of us should ask ourselves: What do I need to get rid of? What temptations do I need to avoid? What is keeping me from total obedience to Christ? If we don’t get rid of these things, we’ll be trapped. We need to remember that as Christians we are on the way to our eternal Promised Land. We are under the watchful care of our Guardian Savior—Jesus Christ—who has won the victory and whose kingdom is advancing little by little. There is no room for compromise. That brings us to our last next step this morning: Not settle for a partial victory that falls short of full obedience to Jesus Christ.

As the praise team comes to lead us in a final song and the ushers prepare to collect the tithes and offerings, let’s pray: Lord God, thank you for this opportunity to be in your Word this morning. I pray that each of us will take something new with us and share it with those we come in contact with this week. Help us by your Holy Spirit to destroy the idols and sacred stones in our lives that keep us from worshiping You. Help us to not allow the gods of this world to be a snare to us in worshiping You. And help us to not settle for a partial victory that falls short of full obedience to Jesus Christ. And Lord, help us to demand absolute, undying loyalty and obedience to you from ourselves. May we strive to be holy people, becoming more like your son, Jesus, every single day. In Jesus’s name, Amen