Sermon: Faith in the Greater

You take a copy of God's word This morning we're gonna turn open to the book of Hebrews. I wanna grab a pew Bible right in front of you. You can turn open to page 1008 in the Pew Bible. This morning we are looking at Hebrews chapter 11 and specifically verses 23 through 29 this morning. Hebrews chapter 11.

Let's go ahead and pray before we open God's word up together this morning.

Father, we come before you this morning with humble spirits.

We've bow our heads as a outward sign of that truth. For we are utterly dependent upon you. We are lost in this world without hope. We're trapped in darkness. Without light. We are dead and there is no life within us, apart from you're working and working by the power of your word. I pray this morning that you would meet each and every soul in this room as we have need that all of the distractions of our own minds and our hearts, the distractions in this room,

the distractions that I may offer as a preacher, all of them would quickly disappear and that we would find that we hear your loud, resounding, authoritative voice in our ears and down into the very recesses of our hearts and we pray all of this in the strong name of Christ Jesus, that great prophet and the king of our lives. Amen. Hebrews chapter 11 verses 23 through 29. This is the holy aner sufficient word of God by faith.

Moses when he was born was hidden for three months by his parents because they saw that the child was beautiful and they were not afraid of the king's edict by faith. Moses when he was grown up, refused to be called the son of Pharaoh's daughter, choosing rather to be mistreated with the people of God than to enjoy the fleeting pleasures of sin. He considered the reproach of Christ's greater wealth than the treasures of Egypt

where he was looking to the reward by faith. He left Egypt not being afraid of the anger of the king, for he endured a seen him who is invisible by faith. He kept the Passover and sprinkled the blood so that the destroyer of the firstborn might not touch them by faith. The people crossed the Red Sea as on dry land, but the Egyptians when they attempted to do the same were drowned. But the grass withers and the flower fades.

The word of God is forever. Thanks. Speed to God. Amen.

We'll return this week after doing our faith focus in January, returning this week to the book of Hebrews and picking up where we left off. We were in Hebrews chapter 11. Hebrews chapter 11, just as a little refresher reminder to you is often called the great Hall of fame of faith. It is um, this chapter that the writer of Hebrews is walking through all of these different Old Testament saints and the faith that they exhibited

and as he gets to this point, he is on the life of Moses and spends a number of verses covering the life of Moses and he does so because Moses was a man of faith. I was thinking about that fact this week and thinking about this. I wonder what people will say of me when I've passed away. When I've gone home to glory. Wonder what people will save of you may eulogize you when they reflect back on your life. I think of Moses here that there are many things

that could have been said of Moses. He was a prophet, he was a great leader, he was a teacher, he was a brother, he was a father, he was a husband.

But what the scripture say over and over about Moses and what the writer of Hebrews picks up here is that he was a man of faith. He's a great man of faith.

I wonder if that will be said of you and i. I hope so. What I want to do this morning is look at that in the life of Moses, that he was this great man of faith and then see what kind of principles we can gather from it for our own lives. I want to come back at the end of our sermon to verse 23. What I want to do is start in verse 24 at Moses, a man of faith, our first point this morning, as as a man of faith, he chose pain over pleasure.

He chose pain over pleasure. Moses was an adopted child of Pharaoh's daughter. You know the story, you'll remember the account that all of the male children born to the Hebrews. At this time, Pharaoh had declared that they were to be dashed against the rocks. And here you have Moses' parents and when he is born they see the beauty of this child as the writer of Hebrews says. And they decide to stash away Moses for three months

and hide him so that he is not put to death. He is then, as you know, he is put in a basket, a read basket, and he is floated down the Nile River by his mother and his sister. Miriam watches over him and the basket finds its way to Pharaoh's daughter as she is bathing with her servants there in the Nile River and she takes baby Moses in her arms and she decides to take this Hebrew child as her home her own. If history and speculation is correct, it appears

that Moses was the only male descendant of Pharaoh at this time. And so he is at the very center of the Egyptian kingdom. He is at the very center of all prestige. He is at the very center of all position and he is at the very center of what our future promises, what even promises to be greater authority and position and prestige. And yet, as the writer says in verse 24, Moses chose rather to be mistreated with the people

of God than to enjoy the pleading, the fleeting pleasures of sin. Being in the court of Pharaoh would've been a life of continual sin. And in faith, Moses chose, he chose in faith to leave the court. You'll notice that the writer rightfully labeled sin. He he notes that it is pleasurable. Sin offers pleasure. If there wasn't pleasure and sin, you and I wouldn't be tempted by sin. Moses was tempted. But what you have to keep reminding yourself

and have to keep reminding yourself over and over and over again what Moses clearly knew and understood and what the author of Hebrews says here clearly about sin, the pleasure of sin is that it is fleeting, it's temporal. It's it's temporary. Moses understood this. He understood that though Egypt seemed to be the most ancient and most fixed of kingdoms, the very center of the world, the the pleasure sin brought at the center of

that kingdom and being part of that kingdom and everything that had offered that, all of that pleasure that sin would bring, that it was fleeting and he forsook it.

Sin promises much. Moses understood this but it delivers very little.

It cannot and it does not ever satisfy.

There's a reason that you hear the story from drug abusers that they started on this or that drug and they did some of it and then it wasn't enough and so they had to take more and then that more wasn't enough and so they had to move on to a harder drug. It's just a little microcosm of sin. Sin never satisfies. It's never satiated. One white lie is told and then another white lie is told and then a greater lie is told and a greater lie is told

and all of a sudden the person is dwelling in a web of lies. One look, a glance at that website turns into staring at the next website and then those staring at websites. It's not enough. And so it has to be greater and worse websites,

it's never satiated, sin doesn't rest. It offers pleasure but that pleasure is fleeting. Temporary. It's temporary in duration. It's temporary in effect. And Moses understood this and so we could say it this way, he, he chooses pain over pleasure. Faith often requires this it choose, requires you and I to choose pain over pleasure. He chose as the author says, rather to be mistreated. That is to suffer affliction. That's what it means in the original language

to suffer affliction with the people of God. He chose pain over pleasure. Now that doesn't seem like a great choice. Who wants to sign up for that? But that's what faith often demands.

Why would a teenager, many of our teenagers this morning, our high schoolers are off on retreat coming back this afternoon, but why is it that a teenager would choose to befriend that other kid that all of the kids in school or all of the kids in church make fun of and laugh at because eventually they'll start laughing and making fun of you. 'cause faith often requires you to choose pain over pleasure.

Why is it that some of you are in circles where gossip and making fun of others is a regular routine and part of the culture and you would choose to stand up and say that's wrong when you know that they'll consider you stiff a killjoy? 'cause faith often requires you and I to choose pain over pleasure. Why is it that some of you academics, you sit in your departmental meetings and Christ is ridiculed and you feel the need to to speak out on behalf

of Christ knowing that it could mean that your advancement in that department is going to be halted and you will be called a fundamentalist or even worse a bigot. Because faith often requires you and I to choose pain over pleasure.

Moses understood this. Why no one likes pain. Everyone likes pleasure. I mean notice what Moses understood what the same thing that every person of faith in Christ understand as pleasure in this world is fleeting. So pain in this world is fleeting. It's temporary to be very clear, when we choose Christ over sin, we are not simply choosing pain over pleasure, we are choosing fleeting pain over fleeting pleasure.

And that leads to our second point. Faith chooses what is lasting. Chooses what is lasting. The writer says of our savior in chapter 12 as we'll, get there in a few weeks and points you and I to our savior. In looking to him, he says, we are to look to Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him, endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God.

Jesus chose what was lasting. He chose pain over pleasure, fleeting, pain over fleeting pleasure. The cross before the crown as is often said and now what? Now he reigns eternally at the right hand of God on a throne forever. He chose what was lasting and as it was true of Christ, so it's true of his people. Moses verse 26 was looking to the reward, what was lasting? Faith does not ask us to simply choose pain over pleasure,

but to choose fleeting pain over fleeting pleasure so that we can enjoy eternal pleasure, lasting pleasure, forever pleasure.

The decisions you make today, my friends, they reverberate on into eternity.

The question is, as you think about Moses' life and you think about this, the question is what shall you choose?

It's not a rhetorical question, what shall you choose?

Because every single minute, every single hour, every single week, month, year of our lives we're choosing

am I choosing that which is fleeting and passing?

Am I choosing that which is lasting and eternal

to have all my glory and pleasure in this fading world or to have all my glory and pleasure in the world to come?

Moses chose the better. Verse 26, he considered the reproach of Christ greater than the treasures of Egypt. For he was looking to the reward. Faith chooses what is lasting. Understood. You understand,

I've said this to you before. My greatest concern for the church today is not what many in our circles are worked up about and focused on, focused on the cultural pressures that we are facing today. Make no mistake, I'm I'm alarmed by them. I'm concerned about them. The increasing level of wickedness that we see our culture embracing. I'm concerned about the pressure that's being applied by teachers and schools and media and employers and government.

These threats are very real,

but I truly believe, truly believe there's a greater threat to our faith than these things. It's what makes these things acceptable to us and that is this is that you and I just become comfortable here.

Moses wasn't comfortable with what he had. He wasn't comfortable in the land that he was dwelling in. He was looking forward to the reward to where he was headed,

let's say in part, not wholly, but in part I think the evangelical church in America has worked up right now because we have become far too comfortable. You see, it's never really, really cost us to have faith here, but now increasingly it is

and the question is, is whether we will choose that which is fleeting or whether we will choose that which is everlasting, whether we will choose that which is fading or that which will be glorious forever, that which dissipates and disappears or that which lasts forever.

Moses chose that which lasted forever, which leads to our third point. Faith looks to God say, well preacher, I could have come up with that point. I agree you could have seems pretty simple,

but it's so simple that I think it's often missed by us and it's forgotten by us. Faith looks to God. That is what Moses is doing. He's looking to God. Notice verse 27, Moses by faith he left Egypt not being afraid of the anger of the king. How? How does one stand and lose all that he is going to lose in the culture that he is within with true threat to his person. The second half of verse 27, he endured as seen him who is invisible.

He looked to God, he looked to the invisible God. Pharaoh was not in control. Moses understood that he was not in control. He understood that the culture he was in was not in control, but that God was in control and so he looked to God with the eyes of faith. He looked to God the trap in our days to be dominated by the headlines. We live in this continuous news cycle that makes money by getting you revved up, by getting you

to come back for more.

If you watch Fox News or CNN or M-S-N-B-C, if you are on TikTok or Twitter or Facebook, if you listen to podcasts, secular Christian that covers the news today, you are confronted day in and day out with the horrific, with the unthinkable, with the threatening. Why? Because it entertains and it pulls you in and it feels like everything is falling apart. We are watching our world as we know it just circle the drain. Everything is out of control

and we have fear of what is happening, fear of what is being lost, fear of what is coming.

Do you look to God and faith?

Are you looking to God in faith?

Moses, the son of Pharaoh's daughter, did not believe himself nor even Pharaoh to be in control, not being afraid of the anger of the king. He set out with eyes of faith.

I often think about this in the morning when I'm getting ready, I will look in the mirror. I'm shaving and often remind myself of this. I say, Jason, you're just not that important. And I remind myself that you know what? You've been sleeping for the past 6, 7, 8 hours and the world was perfectly fine without you doesn't need me. I'm not in control and here's news, you're not in control and here's greater news. No social media is in control. No politician is in control.

No government is in control. No agenda is in control. God is in control and we looked to him with the eyes of faith. Moses understood this. He looked in faith to God That was just hardest to see in this world. God is the most permanent and lasting thing in this world. Moses understood that.

Well, my concerns about the present church in America is that we think too little of God,

too many Christians and too many churches that are chasing the culture's tale,

not looking to God but fearing what they see and this is not living by faith.

Whatever new threat has come, that is where their focus shifts.

Now we as the church we are to try and equip in different ways to address various particular challenges that are in our day that is good discipleship. We want to know how to think through things biblically together. This is the reason our magnify conferences have focused on this in recent years. Why the Philadelphia Conference on Reform theology that we'll be here in a couple months. We'll focus on this. This is why our elders

and our staff had read through different books so that we are equipped and minister in this culture and come alongside of you in that. That's why some of our men's and women's studies have done some of these books to study some of these cultural issues. It's why our children and youth ministry especially dig has addressed these on different occasions and gone on retreats in the conferences that address these very things.

It's why some of our faith focuses over the last number of years have focused on these things and it is why we preach from this pulpit when the text calls for it on this or that cultural issue, but we are not chasing the culture's tale because the culture does not dictate to the church

what you and I principally need is not a steady diet of chasing the culture's tale. The church has stood the pressures of differing in disparate cultures for millennia. The gates of hell shall not prevail against the church. That promise has not disappeared with the threats of transgenderism or homosexuality or postmodernism. We don't chase the culture's tail. The church stood in Moses' day. It stood in Paul's day. It stood in Esther's day.

It will stand in our day

because he's in control

and we look to this invisible God with the eyes of faith and we simply just trust him.

He's at work in this world.

If a person came to you and said, I stopped eating meat, vegetables, and fruit. I'm now just taking medications and vaccines to address every disease that threatens me.

You'd say your obsession with disease is going to kill you and you'd be exactly right. Why? Because you need a steady diet that gives Life the Church and the individual Christian needs less a steady diet of medicine to combat every cultural disease and more. A steady diet of biblical truth focused on the invisible God because that gives health against every disease that Comes And new ones are coming, They change.

We don't chase the tail. We look to the invisible God who does not change. That is the way to withstand every cultural and worldly disease. Moses was healthy. He was healthy enough to stand and withstand the temptations of his world. All that was going on in Egypt, he's at the Very center of it and talk About pagan beyond pagan and persecution beyond persecution and threat, beyond threat. And he was able to stand in the midst of it. Why?

Because he looked to the invisible God with his eyes.

He looked to him, faith looks to God.

Again. It's simple to say and that's why I'm spending so much time. It's it's so simple to say it's quite another to do because the culture is here.

God is invisible,

but he's more real than the culture you dwell in. He's more fixed Than the Things that are assaulting you. He's more True than the hand That is before my faith.

Faith looks to him.

Moses did amidst all the cultural pressures. I can't even imagine all that came to bear upon him. He said, but God spoke to him. Yes, and he's spoken to you. He's spoken to you this morning by his word. He has spoken to you by this word, which tells you who he is and tells you what he has done. The mighty things that he has done, the promises that he holds out to you for eternal reward. All the ways that he's seeking to support your faith

underneath to say, look, I am a faithful covenant, keeping God the same God of Abraham and Isaac and Jacob as I brought them and the church and their day through deep waters. So I bring the church in your Day through deep waters. Just as I dashed The Egyptians when they tried to come across the Red Sea brought forth the people on dry ground. So I bring my people forth on dry ground.

He redeems. He's worthy of trust.

Moses had to exercise faith in what He could not see this invisible God, just like you and I. There's this curious verse 26 in which we were told that Moses considered the reproach of Christ greater wealth than the treasures of Egypt. Isn't that interesting? Christ,

he considered the reproach of Christ.

He believed in the promise of this messiah to come that he could not see.

He believed that God was true to his promises and said because he said he would send a redeemer into this world to save his people. Moses just trusted and he believed in this Christ, though he could not see him.

Jesus said in John five as a rebuke, he said, if you believed Moses, you would believe me or he wrote of me. Yes, Moses had directly heard from God and he also had to have faith in the promise of this Christ home. He could not see him. In fact, Moses won't see Christ until he sees him first on the Mount of Transfiguration. It's there that finally he sees a son of God in bodily form. It's there that his faith becomes sight.

Faith looks to God the invisible God, a trust in the promise of the Christ. Finally, faith willingly chooses to lose all faith willingly chooses to lose all.

Moses was willing to lose all in faith. He was willing to lose all, to gain all. And that's the calculation for all who claim Christ in faith. Paul said that he counted all things as loss compared to the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus. My Lord, for his sake, I have suffered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish in order that I may gain Christ. Jesus said, if you would come after me, you must deny yourself.

Pick up your cross. It is die to yourself and follow me. We willingly lose all, but we do so to gain all. And that's the calculation.

Math is really not that difficult.

Jim Elliot, the missionary killed in 1956 by the ACA Indians in Ecuador, had written in his journal right before he died. It was one of his final entries. What is maybe one of the best summaries of this principle from the scriptures when he wrote this? He said, he is no fool who gives up what he cannot keep to gain what he cannot lose.

It's fleeting. This is lasting. That is fading. This is glorious. That is temporal. This is everlasting. It's not a hard calculation.

JC Riel said this about Moses.

It's a marvel, not that he refused greatness, riches and pleasure. He looked far forward. He saw with the eye of faith kingdoms crumbling into dust, riches making to themselves wings and fleeing away pleasures leading on to death and judgment and Christ only. And his little flock enduring forever. He saw with the eye of faith, affliction lasting. But for a moment reproach roll away, an ending an everlasting honor and the despised people of God reigning as kings

with Christ in glory. Moses was willing to lose all, To gain all.

Just give two more particular applications this morning in light of thinking about this, of Moses dwelling in such a land of wickedness where he's opposed by the culture and yet standing as a man of faith. How is it that he endures such a thing?

First is this, she were to look to the invisible God that is be more animated about the glory of God than you are about anything else, including the evil of this world.

Be a person of faith in God, not simply a name, but in life Where faith is the heartbeat of your life. It's what directs your eyes and moves your tongue and shapes who you are

that you're remembered rightfully as a man or a woman of faith.

Concern is a summer, just a degree off

staff makes fun of me. 'cause I I say it like this. This is how it, I pictured in my mind it is. It's just being a degree off, just having the wrong tincture. And I, the way I view it, it's like a radio dial. I know you don't use radio dials anymore, but like a radio dial. But yeah, you tune in that radio station in and you're just a, just not quite tuned in. You're you're you're 0.2 off. And so it's staticky and sometimes it comes in and it goes out.

And that's my concern.

We just went through our faith focus on confessionalism. A slight degree off can be entirely off. Listen, if you are animated about the glory of God, then you'll be animated about the evil of this world. But too many of us are more animated about the evil of this world than we are of the glory of God. And I know this because it's what's talked about and it's what's most excitedly talked about.

If that's the case to your eye is a degree of, and it's a world of difference.

Notice what the author highlights is is not Moses's concern for the disease of Egypt, but the God who may look to in faith. Again, it's a slight degree of difference, but it is all the difference. He was looking to his reward heaven. The motivation was glory. He considered the reproach of Christ's greater wealth. It was the redeemer to come that filled his eyes. Again, not the evils of the world. By faith, he left Egypt not being afraid of the king faith.

He had his eyes set on God. He wasn't driven by the culture even hatred of it though that was surely there. He was driven, animated by the glory of the invisible God. Again, a slight difference, but so very important.

For example, Christian parents. I hope you're talking about the news around your dinner tables and I hope you're doing so, so that you are equipping your children to understand how to think biblically through some of the things that are happening in our day. But is that the primary discourse around your dinner tables?

We want our children to delight the beauty and the glories of God in the truth of God. We want our children not to simply despise what is sinful and silly and horrific though we want that. We want them to be Caught up to be caught up with the beauty of Christ.

You want That continually set before them.

Is that what you're Most animated about around your dinner table?

We can give them all kinds of medication and yet be sparingly feeding them what grants hope eternally.

Is your dinner table more animated in conversation about the politics today or about the personal work of Christ?

I'm not asking that rhetorical. I want you to seriously think about it.

Do your children know that your delight in Christ is more than your fleeting earthly opinions or you're fleeting love for MSU basketball or this kind of politics or this kind of food

or generally for all of us as our talk, filling each other with the glimpses of the glory of God or more so the gutter of this world. Again, we have to talk about the gutter, but not in the same way, not in the same manner with the same excitement that we discuss and delight in and encourage one another in God and God.

It's, it's just a slight degree of, And it's a world of difference,

Which Leads to my final application. Understand that your exercising faith matters not just for you but for the generation to come. I want you To see the importance of the home in helping the next generation to stand in faith with in a culture that's opposed to our faith. And we consider Moses this great man of faith. You have to wonder and say where does, where does such faith come from?

How? How does a man at the center of, of paganism and at the center of a culture that is set against the people of God and at the center of a religion that is opposed to God and he is at the height of position and prestige and power and wealth, how is it that he stands in faith?

The writer fe gives you a little hint and the answer is that Moses saw such faith first in his parents.

Notice the repetition. Verse 23 in verse 27. You know the story. Pharaoh had decreed that all the Jewish boys were to be killed upon birth. But Moses' mother and father, by faith, they hide him for three months. Verse 23. They were not afraid of the king's edict. And then Moses verse 27, by faith left Egypt not being afraid of the anger of the king. Where did Moses get such faith from? From the example of his parents.

I have three different people come up to me after the first service say, okay, help me to understand this because he becomes Pharaoh's daughter's son after three months. So we only had three months with him. Yes, but there has to be some connection. We know that his mother nursed him. We know that he identified with the Hebrews when he kills that Egyptian slave. He was already identifying with the Hebrew people. It's not like Charleston Heston in the 10 Commandments

where all of a sudden he discovers this blanket in a crib and at the age of 40 realizes I'm a Hebrew. It appears he always knew that he was, when he appears before God, before that burning bush and says, I don't want to go down to Egypt. God says to Ah, well then I'm gonna send your brother Aaron. He doesn't go Aaron who he knows. So no doubt he knew the story. He knew of the faith of his parents. And so it's no mistake that the writer

of Hebrews is echoing the same language. What he saw in his parents was manifest in him

was children are watching. He learned from us. They listen to our words, but even more so they're watching your actions.

What would they say you are passionate about?

What would they say you talk most about? What would they say your faith looks like?

I had a, a pastor friend that was older than me. Uh, he lived an incredibly rebellious life as a teenager, but then came to saving faith later. And he said what kept going through his mind when he was living in rebellion during those teenage years was a picture that he had of his home when he was growing up. His dad worked 14 hour days and worked hard. And he said every night when he would walk through the family room, he would walk

by his parents' bedroom door and every night he would see his dad. After working that 14 hour day, he would see him propped up on a pillow in his bed with his head up against the headboard and pillows on his stomach and the Bible, open on the pillows

his dad exhausted.

He had a man that was looking the invisible God with the eyes of faith. And he said, I couldn't get that picture out of my head.

Watching how you and I respond in faith in this generation is not only important for us, but for the generation to follow.

Are we known for our faith?

Our lives match what we say we believe. Moses' parents' faith did and truly believe it impacted Moses

live a life being filled with seeing him who is invisible best for your soul and for the souls that come after you. Let's pray.

Father, we are thankful that you've chosen to reveal yourself to us.

You are a God who is in control of all things.

We pray that we would not be so caught up in this world.

We are not looking to you with the eyes of faith. Help us to see you as looming larger than anything else. Help the motivations of our hearts, our souls, to be after you and after that eternal reward. Being willing to forsake the pleasures, the fleeting pleasures of sin and the fleeting treasures of this world. Just so we might be with you and glorify you may be true of every soul in this room. Pray all of us in the strong name of Christ Jesus. Amen.