God Says: I’ve Got Your Back
God Says: I’ve Got Your Back
Exodus 14:19-31
Christian Community Presbyterian Church
Bowie, Maryland
7 July 2019
James Brassard is preaching a series on the Psalms. So, to tie his previous sermons with those still to come, let me start off with a familiar psalm verse: “He leads me beside still waters.” You all know where that quotation comes from, don’t you? Psalm 23.
Preachers notwithstanding, pew populating Presbyterians and other pious people get a significant portion of their theological training from hymns. Many hymns tell us that God leads. Here are some from the hymn books in the pew racks in front of you:
From the hardback Presbyterian Hymnal (1990):
In today’s reading, the Exodus writer tells us quite plainly: “The angel of God” — which is an indirect way of speaking of God — “who was going before the Israelite army moved and went behind them; and the pillar of cloud moved from in front of them and took its place behind them.”
I don’t know about you, but if I were one of the Israelites, I would have been complaining. You remember that the Israelites had complaining down pat. The people didn’t sign on to be the vanguard of this massive escape operation. How could they follow if there wasn’t a leader out in front?
Rabbis have handed a story down across the ages which said that the waters didn’t part until someone had waded into the sea up to their nose. If that’s the case, a couple of things follow.
So what about God being behind the Israelites rather than out in front? Fake news? I don’t think so. Is it possible that God leads from behind? And I don’t mean that God goes behind us to give us a good swift kick in the seat of the pants (even if we frequently deserve and need one to get us going).
If God were constantly in front of us we wouldn’t have to make those hard decisions we dread. If God were in front of us our lives would be a gigantic conga line where we follow the person in front of us following the person in front of them all the way up to God at the head of the line. We might as well be riding on the Metro—wherever the front car goes on the track, the rear car follows. I don’t know about you, but if that’s the way life is supposed to be, I’ve been off the rails for years.
Life doesn’t follow neatly that way. Life is not one long line of everyone following God. Never has been, never will be. Just like that lead Israelite that had to get into the water up to his nose, we have to get into our lives of faith up to our noses. We can’t just dip a toe into life and give up. We have to plunge in up to our noses.
This is how we plunge in:
So what good is a God who is supposed to lead us if we have to do all the work? For one thing, we aren’t doing all the work. God has helped us through scripture, teaching, preaching, data, and skills to process it all. God is very much leading—but doing it in God’s own way.
Let’s go back to the Israelites. Why did God (in the form of the angel and the pillar of cloud) take up a position at the rear of the whole crowd of Israel? God did that in order to protect the Israelites from the pursuing Egyptians. God stood between angry Pharaoh and his army and the fleeing Israelites. Israelite me would much rather have God between me and Pharaoh than nothing. If God said, “Go in that direction and I’ll cover your back,” I’d be more inclined to do as God said.
God was also protecting the Israelites from their old life in Egypt, a hard and inhumane life that was all they had ever known. God did not intend that for them forever. God knew that in the years of travel the Israelites would miss what they had in Egypt while fearing the unknown future ahead of them.
At the rear God was protecting the Israelites from what was pursuing them as well as what would tempt them to want to go back. By leading from behind, God protected the Israelites from what was chasing them as well as from the mistaken security and familiar comforts of the past.
God does the same thing for us. God protects us from what chases us and threatens us. God protects us from all the things in our pasts which haunt us, such as the slights we have endured and allowed to fester into grudges and thoughts of getting even; or the nagging thoughts of the things we have done or didn’t do that hurt others.
God also saves us from the “good old days,” those nostalgic memories of the halcyon days of yore when everything worked, when Ward and June Cleaver and Harriet and Ozzie Nelson and their families lived wonderful lives with only minor problems and simple solutions. Edith and Archie Bunker could sing, “Those were the days.” The past not only pursues us, it also holds us back.
Protecting us from the past is what salvation is all about. God saves us in the life, ministry, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ. We no longer have to be haunted and hunted by the sins, trespasses, debts of the past. God forms a wall between us and what has gone before. God will not dredge up every miscue and mistake that we ever did, scrutinizing our past as if we were politicians running for office.
God also protects us from the teary-eyed and embroidered memories of things that weren’t as great as we think, telling us to live forward into the future doing the very best we can. God leads us from behind, because God has our back.
We are installing today a new portion of this congregation’s leadership team: ruling elders and deacons. They are called by the Spirit for particular times, places, and purposes. We hardly ever see them all together. The session doesn’t lead with bull horns and whips. The deacons don’t care for us with precisely dosed applications of crying towels, fist bumps, or fellowship donuts.
You remember what Jesus told Nicodemus during the Pharisee’s midnight visit (John 3:8): “The wind blows where it chooses, and you hear the sound of it, but you do not know where it comes from or where it goes. So it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit.”
You don’t always see your congregational leaders, but they are there , behind the scenes in committee meetings, session meetings, deacons meetings. They are working to discern how best to extend the Gospel’s grace in our community and how best to guide each of you in being faithful to the ministry calling of your baptism.
Our elders and deacons are guiding and protecting you. They are protecting you from the failures of the past. They are standing between you and those dreaded seven last words of the church: “We’ve never done it that way before.” They are guiding you through programs, events, worship, and prayer into the future God is preparing for CCPC. They are leading as they receive your ministry ideas and send you out with blessing for mission.
Through the faithfulness of the elders and deacons, each of us is led to be an agent of mission in the name of Christ, in the power of the Holy Spirit, and for the glory of God.
You and I are up to our noses on the front line of ministry no matter where we are, whom we are with, or when it may occur. Our elders and deacons, like God the deliverer of the Israelites, have got our backs, protecting us and guiding us as we wade into the world (home, school, work, retirement).
Thanks be to God for the Spirit-filled leaders called to serve CCPC. Thanks be to God for having our backs. Thanks be to the God who leads us in such an exciting and innovative way.
Exodus 14:19-31
Christian Community Presbyterian Church
Bowie, Maryland
7 July 2019
James Brassard is preaching a series on the Psalms. So, to tie his previous sermons with those still to come, let me start off with a familiar psalm verse: “He leads me beside still waters.” You all know where that quotation comes from, don’t you? Psalm 23.
Preachers notwithstanding, pew populating Presbyterians and other pious people get a significant portion of their theological training from hymns. Many hymns tell us that God leads. Here are some from the hymn books in the pew racks in front of you:
From the hardback Presbyterian Hymnal (1990):
- Savior, like a shepherd lead us, / Much we need Thy tender care. [PH 387]
- Lead on, O King eternal, / The day of march has come. [PH 447]
- Dance, then wherever you may be; / I am the Lord of the Dance, said He, / And I’ll lead you all, wherever you may, / And I’ll lead you all in the dance, said He. [PH 302]
- Lead me, guide me, along the way, for if you lead me, I cannot stray.[STF 2214]
- Lead on, O cloud of Presence, / the exodus is come. ... Lead on, O fiery Pillar, / follow yet with fears. ... Lead on, O God of freedom, / and guide us on our way. [STF 2234]
In today’s reading, the Exodus writer tells us quite plainly: “The angel of God” — which is an indirect way of speaking of God — “who was going before the Israelite army moved and went behind them; and the pillar of cloud moved from in front of them and took its place behind them.”
I don’t know about you, but if I were one of the Israelites, I would have been complaining. You remember that the Israelites had complaining down pat. The people didn’t sign on to be the vanguard of this massive escape operation. How could they follow if there wasn’t a leader out in front?
Rabbis have handed a story down across the ages which said that the waters didn’t part until someone had waded into the sea up to their nose. If that’s the case, a couple of things follow.
- The first person into the water was a fool or was pushed; and
- God must be afraid of water.
- Genesis says that “the wind from God [the Spirit] swept over the face of the waters” prior to Creation [Gen. 1:2]; and
- On day two God separated the waters above from the waters below and on day three pooled the lower waters to create dry land [Gen. 1:6; Gen. 1:9-10]. Obviously God didn’t want to slosh through all that water.
So what about God being behind the Israelites rather than out in front? Fake news? I don’t think so. Is it possible that God leads from behind? And I don’t mean that God goes behind us to give us a good swift kick in the seat of the pants (even if we frequently deserve and need one to get us going).
If God were constantly in front of us we wouldn’t have to make those hard decisions we dread. If God were in front of us our lives would be a gigantic conga line where we follow the person in front of us following the person in front of them all the way up to God at the head of the line. We might as well be riding on the Metro—wherever the front car goes on the track, the rear car follows. I don’t know about you, but if that’s the way life is supposed to be, I’ve been off the rails for years.
Life doesn’t follow neatly that way. Life is not one long line of everyone following God. Never has been, never will be. Just like that lead Israelite that had to get into the water up to his nose, we have to get into our lives of faith up to our noses. We can’t just dip a toe into life and give up. We have to plunge in up to our noses.
This is how we plunge in:
- We listen to what God has told us through Jesus, the apostles, and the prophets.
- We observe what is going on around us.
- We use the brain power given us by God.
So what good is a God who is supposed to lead us if we have to do all the work? For one thing, we aren’t doing all the work. God has helped us through scripture, teaching, preaching, data, and skills to process it all. God is very much leading—but doing it in God’s own way.
Let’s go back to the Israelites. Why did God (in the form of the angel and the pillar of cloud) take up a position at the rear of the whole crowd of Israel? God did that in order to protect the Israelites from the pursuing Egyptians. God stood between angry Pharaoh and his army and the fleeing Israelites. Israelite me would much rather have God between me and Pharaoh than nothing. If God said, “Go in that direction and I’ll cover your back,” I’d be more inclined to do as God said.
God was also protecting the Israelites from their old life in Egypt, a hard and inhumane life that was all they had ever known. God did not intend that for them forever. God knew that in the years of travel the Israelites would miss what they had in Egypt while fearing the unknown future ahead of them.
At the rear God was protecting the Israelites from what was pursuing them as well as what would tempt them to want to go back. By leading from behind, God protected the Israelites from what was chasing them as well as from the mistaken security and familiar comforts of the past.
God does the same thing for us. God protects us from what chases us and threatens us. God protects us from all the things in our pasts which haunt us, such as the slights we have endured and allowed to fester into grudges and thoughts of getting even; or the nagging thoughts of the things we have done or didn’t do that hurt others.
God also saves us from the “good old days,” those nostalgic memories of the halcyon days of yore when everything worked, when Ward and June Cleaver and Harriet and Ozzie Nelson and their families lived wonderful lives with only minor problems and simple solutions. Edith and Archie Bunker could sing, “Those were the days.” The past not only pursues us, it also holds us back.
Protecting us from the past is what salvation is all about. God saves us in the life, ministry, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ. We no longer have to be haunted and hunted by the sins, trespasses, debts of the past. God forms a wall between us and what has gone before. God will not dredge up every miscue and mistake that we ever did, scrutinizing our past as if we were politicians running for office.
God also protects us from the teary-eyed and embroidered memories of things that weren’t as great as we think, telling us to live forward into the future doing the very best we can. God leads us from behind, because God has our back.
We are installing today a new portion of this congregation’s leadership team: ruling elders and deacons. They are called by the Spirit for particular times, places, and purposes. We hardly ever see them all together. The session doesn’t lead with bull horns and whips. The deacons don’t care for us with precisely dosed applications of crying towels, fist bumps, or fellowship donuts.
You remember what Jesus told Nicodemus during the Pharisee’s midnight visit (John 3:8): “The wind blows where it chooses, and you hear the sound of it, but you do not know where it comes from or where it goes. So it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit.”
You don’t always see your congregational leaders, but they are there , behind the scenes in committee meetings, session meetings, deacons meetings. They are working to discern how best to extend the Gospel’s grace in our community and how best to guide each of you in being faithful to the ministry calling of your baptism.
Our elders and deacons are guiding and protecting you. They are protecting you from the failures of the past. They are standing between you and those dreaded seven last words of the church: “We’ve never done it that way before.” They are guiding you through programs, events, worship, and prayer into the future God is preparing for CCPC. They are leading as they receive your ministry ideas and send you out with blessing for mission.
Through the faithfulness of the elders and deacons, each of us is led to be an agent of mission in the name of Christ, in the power of the Holy Spirit, and for the glory of God.
You and I are up to our noses on the front line of ministry no matter where we are, whom we are with, or when it may occur. Our elders and deacons, like God the deliverer of the Israelites, have got our backs, protecting us and guiding us as we wade into the world (home, school, work, retirement).
Thanks be to God for the Spirit-filled leaders called to serve CCPC. Thanks be to God for having our backs. Thanks be to the God who leads us in such an exciting and innovative way.
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