We read from Holy Scripture this morning, Exodus chapter 14, Exodus 14. And the Lord spake unto Moses, saying, Speak unto the children of Israel, that they turn and encamp before Pi-haharoth, between Migdal and the sea, over against Baal-zephon. before it shall ye encamp by the sea. For Pharaoh will say of the children of Israel, they are entangled in the land, the wilderness hath shut them in. And I will harden Pharaoh's heart that he shall follow after them. And I will be honored among Pharaoh and upon all his host that the Egyptians may know that I am the Lord. And they did so. And it was told the king of Egypt, that the people fled, and the heart of Pharaoh and of his servants was turned against the people, and they said, Why have we done this, that we have let Israel go from serving us? And he made ready his chariot, and took his people with him. And he took six hundred chosen chariots, and all the chariots of Egypt, and captains over every one of them. And the Lord hardened the heart of Pharaoh, king of Egypt, and he pursued after the children of Israel, and the children of Israel went out with a high hand. But the Egyptians pursued after them, all the horses and chariots of Pharaoh, and his horsemen, and his army, and overtook them in camping by the sea beside Pi-haharoth before Baal-zephon. And when Pharaoh drew nigh, the children of Israel lifted up their eyes, and behold, the Egyptians marched after them. And they were sore afraid. And the children of Israel cried out unto the Lord. And they said unto Moses, Because there were no graves in Egypt, Hast thou taken us away to die in the wilderness? Wherefore hast thou dealt thus with us to carry us forth out of Egypt? Is not this the word that we did tell thee in Egypt, saying, let us alone, that we may serve the Egyptians? For it had been better for us to serve the Egyptians than that we should die in the wilderness. And Moses said unto the people, fear ye not, stand still, and see the salvation of the Lord, which he will show to you today. For the Egyptians whom ye have seen today, ye shall see them again no more forever. The Lord shall fight for you and ye shall hold your peace. And the Lord said unto Moses, wherefore cryest thou unto me? Speak unto the children of Israel that they go forward, but lift thou up thy rod. and stretch out thine hand over the sea and divide it. And the children of Israel shall go on dry ground through the midst of the sea. And I behold, I will harden the hearts of the Egyptians and they shall follow them. and I will get me honor upon Pharaoh and upon all his hosts, upon his chariots and upon his horsemen. And the Egyptians shall know that I am the Lord when I have gotten me honor upon Pharaoh, upon his chariots and upon his horsemen. And the angel of God, which went before the camp of Israel, removed and went behind them. And the pillar of the cloud went from before their face and stood behind them. And it came between the camp of the Egyptians and the camp of Israel. And it was a cloud and darkness to them, but it gave light by night to these, so that the one came not near the other all the night. And Moses stretched out his hand over the sea, and now what follows is our text until the end of the chapter. And Moses stretched out his hand over the sea, and the Lord caused the sea to go back by a strong east wind all that night, and made the sea dry land, and the waters were divided. And the children of Israel went into the midst of the sea upon the dry ground. And the waters were a wall unto them on their right hand and on their left. And the Egyptians pursued and went in after them to the midst of the sea, even all Pharaoh's horses, his chariots, and his horsemen. And it came to pass that in the morning watch The Lord looked unto the host of the Egyptians through the pillar of fire and of the cloud, and troubled the host of the Egyptians, and took off their chariot wheels, that they drove them heavily, so that the Egyptians said, let us flee from the face of Israel, for the Lord fighteth for them against the Egyptians. And the Lord said unto Moses, stretch out thine hand over the sea, that the waters may come again upon the Egyptians, upon their chariots, and upon their horsemen. And Moses stretched forth his hand over the sea, and the sea returned to his strength when the morning appeared. And the Egyptians fled against it. And the Lord overthrew the Egyptians in the midst of the sea. And the waters returned and covered the chariots and the horsemen and all the host of Pharaoh that came into the sea after them. There remained not so much as one of them. But the children of Israel walked upon dry land in the midst of the sea, and the waters were a wall unto them on their right hand and on their left. Thus the Lord saved Israel that day out of the hand of the Egyptians, and Israel saw the Egyptians dead upon the seashore. And Israel saw that great work which the Lord did upon the Egyptians, and the people feared the Lord and believed the Lord and his servant Moses. Beloved in our Lord Jesus Christ. This is one of the most memorable and significant events, not only in Old Testament history, but in all the history of the Church. Even the description of these events is laid out in such a way that we can easily, easily see the drama, of those events and what it would have invoked in the hearts and minds of the children of Israel as well as the Egyptians. It's all laid out very clearly in the passage. You would think that after God had poured out these 10 plagues upon the nation of Egypt successively, one after another, those plagues, leaving the once great world power of Egypt into a smoking hulk, its firstborn slain. its Pharaoh and its people humbled so that they cast out the children of Israel, you would think that at that point, Israel is delivered, their salvation is complete. But the Lord has another lesson to teach and to learn, and one that he will teach his people through the ages. After leaving the nation of Egypt, on foot, carrying their belongings, and even laden down with much gold and jewels that were given to them by the Egyptians, plunder from that nation that had so cruelly treated them, and venturing out of Egypt, the Lord deliberately does not allow them to go the normal route to the land of Canaan, a route that would have brought them to the land of Canaan very quickly and easily. But he tells them to take a turn, and then to encamp in the one place that even a child would say is a trap. And the Lord tells His servant Moses to do this, and the children of Israel did it. They encamp on the shores of the Red Sea, that great sea, and on either side of them are two huge mountains. Pharaoh hears word that Israel is in a trap. And he quickly assembles his army, still a ferocious army, the greatest army of the world at this time, having well over 600 chariots plus horsemen. He takes them and he marches quickly after the people of Israel and comes within sight of them. The Lord, who is leading Israel in that pillar of fire, takes himself and parks that pillar between Israel and Egypt, and that, for the moment, keeps them safe, keeps the two people separate. The people despair. They despair of God's mercy. They provoke God. They are filled with unbelief. They charge Moses unjustly and falsely of deliberately taking them into the wilderness to kill them. They even assert their unbelief by saying, we would prefer to be slaves in Egypt than to die in the wilderness. The people are without hope. And God tells Moses to take his rod, that familiar rod with which he had worked the 10 plagues upon Egypt. With that rod, he cleaves the Red Sea so that it parts into two huge towering walls, dry land underneath, and Israel begins to pass over the Red Sea to the other side. Arriving at the other side, the hosts of Pharaoh plunge into that chasm. intent on murdering and destroying the people of Israel. The Lord, again by his servant Moses, brings the walls of water on either side, crashing down on Pharaoh and his hosts, drowning them in that Red Sea. This event is indeed memorable by all the facts and all the players involved. But that's not really what makes it memorial. What makes it memorable is the significance of these events. They're significant in history. The Psalms and the prophets refer to this event time and time again. And they refer to it for two reasons. One, it is an outstanding type of the salvation of the people of God through the blood shed on the cross by Jesus Christ. It is a type of that, as well as a type of baptism, which is a sign and seal of that salvation. Consider with me this morning, saved through the Red Sea. Saved through the Red Sea, and we consider this event under three points. The first is the type, the second the significance, and finally the blessing. The type. This event is a type of the salvation of the people of God. It is a type in as much as this event itself was salvation of the nation of Israel by God Himself. That is emphasized in the text. In verse 13, when the people are filled with unbelief and Moses must bring them the Word of God, he says this, Fear ye not, stand still. and see the salvation of the Lord, which he will show you to you today. Then at the very end of the passage two, we read verse 30, thus the Lord saved Israel that day. This event was the salvation of the people of Israel. It was a salvation of them in really two senses. First of all, it was a salvation from the murderous intentions and the murderous hatred of Pharaoh and his hosts themselves. Pharaoh and his army that are pursuing the nation of Israel. This, because the Lord had hardened again the heart of Pharaoh and his hosts. And therefore, in spite of the warning of the Lord himself, given in every single one of the ten plagues, and by Moses his servant just prior to the last of those plagues, Pharaoh again hardened himself. And he pursued after Israel, the very Israel that he had said should leave and must leave now. who had said that they must leave now because otherwise the entire nation of Egypt will be as dead men. That same Pharaoh now pursues after them, changing his mind, imagining that he now can destroy them. And that's exactly what the children of Israel will sing also in the next chapter. In the next chapter, verse nine, Israel understands what they are saved from, this enemy that said, I will pursue, I will overtake, I will divide the spoil, my lust shall be satisfied upon them, I will draw my sword, my hand shall destroy them. In other words, Pharaoh was intent on destroying as many as he wanted and taking the rest back into Egypt and placing them under bondage to recover the loot that they had given to Israel. You understand, the nation of Israel saw that. You have to imagine the sight, the glistening chariots, the pawing steeds, The swords drawn, the spears out, the arrows notched. You have to see what Israel saw. The steely, cold, dark eyes of the Egyptians filled with rage. Rage at this people, this people that were in their land, that should be their slaves. This people whose God had destroyed them, had killed their cattle, consumed their crops, this people who are responsible in their eyes for the death of all their firstborn, you have to come to grips with the utter hatred and rage and the intention to murder, if not saved, it would have been an utter bloodbath. But the Lord saves them through the Red Sea. What is often overlooked also is that by being saved through the Red Sea, Israel is delivered from Egypt itself. It is remarkable, how often in Scripture, when referring to this event, it refers to it not as salvation from Pharaoh and his hosts as such, but from the entire nation of Egypt and its bondage. That is the very idea of the preface also of the law. Take note how even the law, which continues to be read in the Christian church today of the New Testament every Sunday, is prefaced with this very event. I am the Lord thy God, which brought thee out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage. That's a reference to this deliverance of the Red Sea, for Israel was not simply delivered by the 10 plagues, but they were delivered through the Red Sea And notice how there too, like many of the other references to it in the Old Testament, it refers to their deliverance from the nation itself. Well, what's the great threat there? Ah, their ungodliness, their worldliness, their idolatry, and their adultery. The nation of Egypt represented the world. the lust of the eyes, the pride of life, the good life, serving that good life, serving the creature rather than the creator, being ignorant of God and His righteousness, and establishing their own. They represent the world and the great temptation of that world. And don't forget that that is what plays out in the subsequent history, too. Even after Israel is delivered to the Red Sea, the 40 years in the wilderness is going to be a sad testimony of how threatened Israel actually was in the land of Egypt. In only a short time, they're going to be at Sinai. And none other than Aaron, the great leader, is going to tell them that they should create an idol and worship God through that idol. Time and time again, Israel is going to complain, want to return back because of their lust for the food and the delicacies of Egypt, and that even as slaves. Even now, before the Lord delivers them, there they are, testifying, we would prefer to be slaves than die as free men. Think about that. That is how the world thinks. We would rather live with the sinners who are going to hell than to die with the saints who are going to heaven. We would rather live in this world under the bondage of sin and of Satan, though it leads to war Though it leads to the destruction of the whole human race, we prefer that pleasure for a time rather than to die the Lord's free men. Israel was saved by that passing through the Red Sea. And then that Red Sea closing in over Pharaoh and being again a natural barrier that it was, Israel stood on the side of freedom. Soon they would be in their own land as the free sons and daughters of God, ruling over themselves in the grace of God and enjoying the pleasures of the citizens of the kingdom of God. Now, this is all a type of salvation by Jesus Christ. This is a type of the salvation of God worked in his church and through his church by the blood of Jesus Christ shed on the cross. As great as that deliverance was, it is but a small, small picture of the real deliverance of the people of God throughout time and history through the very blood of Jesus Christ. Now also we must see that this deliverance is a type of baptism. and baptism now especially as it is a sign and seal of that very salvation of Jesus Christ applied to the people of God by the Holy Spirit. And this is too brought out in the Old Testament and therefore incorporated into the understanding of the New Testament. They were saved here significantly by water. Just like in the great flood. God's people were saved by the water, we are told, in the New Testament. So also here the people of God are delivered by the water. They pass through the water and those very waters are what fall back in and destroy the great enemy who is the threat to them. That's the agent of this deliverance. Then notice this, that although they pass through on dry land, their feet are on dry land, the water towering over them on each side sprinkles them with that water, so that they are sprinkled with water as they pass through. That's the other thing that is noted with regard to this history and is a type. according to the New Testament Scriptures. That's expressly stated in 1 Corinthians 10, verses 1 and 2. Moreover, brethren, I would not that ye should be ignorant how that all our fathers were under the cloud and passed through the sea and were all baptized unto Moses in the cloud and in the sea. That being biblical, that also is turned into our confessions. You noticed, of course, in our own baptism form, in the prayer of thanksgiving, we read, Thou who has drowned the obstinate Pharaoh and his host in the Red Sea, but leadest Israel through the midst of the sea on dry ground by which baptism is signified. You have also Article 34 of the Belgian Confession, which I put in the bulletin as a meditation, but take note especially of this line, where it says that baptism is, quote, not affected by the external water, but by the sprinkling of the precious blood of the Son of God, and now notice, Who is our Red Sea? When's the last time that you thought of the Red Sea as a type of Christ? And the salvation of Christ. But that's what we read in our own confession. Through which we must pass to escape the tyranny of Pharaoh. Now notice again another type. That is the devil. that murderous intention and hatred of Pharaoh and his hosts there sitting in their chariots, ready to pounce on the people of God and create a bloodbath, is none other than a type of the devil himself. That's what we read in our own confessions. Now before we move on, we ought to take note that this history also has some implications about baptism, therefore. And I raise them because they have been raised in the history not only of the church, but in our own particular churches. For example, with regard to the issue of infant baptism that became an issue at the time of the Reformation. At the time of the Reformation, there were those who wanted to overthrow the great long-standing tradition of the church for over a thousand years of baptizing infants on the basis that it replaces circumcision. And a sect arose in Protestantism called the Baptists who refused to baptize infants. and those who were baptized as infants had to be re-baptized, hence the name the Anabaptists. Our fathers rightly pointed to this very event as proof that infants also must be baptized, that infants of believing parents and their children ought to be baptized, that infants also belong in the covenant and kingdom of God, for there being held in the arms of their mothers and being held by the hands of their fathers were thousands and thousands of infants and children who were sprinkled with that water of baptism. Our fathers rightly pointed to this event as proof for infant baptism over against the Baptists. Secondly, it has something to say about this truth. Namely, does everyone who is baptized with the sign receive also the reality Our churches faced that question and answered it decisively, no. Not everyone who receives the sign of baptism, that is, the administration of the water, the administration of the water with the words of the minister and by the hands of the minister, receives the reality, that is, receives the sprinkling of the blood of Christ that is typified by that water. That was answered decisively in a number of ways. One of the answers is that this cannot be, because if that were true, that every single child baptized with water or every baptized adult receiving the baptism of water receives also actually the salvation of Jesus Christ, but like all admit, many fall away. Many indeed are not saved. That would mean that the salvation of Christ is ineffective. The grace of Christ is resistible, all which are too horrible a thing to even think about. But one of the things our fathers pointed to in answering that question was, again, the Red Sea. The baptism of the Red Sea. The Scriptures make this very, very clear. That, of course, every single individual of the nation of Israel, those who were the physical descendants of Abraham, passed through the waters of that Red Sea and had the waters sprinkled on them also. But did all receive the reality? And the answer is no. No subsequent history is going to bring that out in very, very sad detail. Many were still filled with unbelief. Many dropped like flies in the wilderness, as the Bible says, because of their unbelief. They were not saved, even though they had been sprinkled with the water. And the same remains true today of the very type, the very sign and seal of the sprinkling of water in baptism. We ought to keep that in mind. Now we're going to move on next to the significance of all this. What's the significance of all this? That's really the issue. That's what this is all about. What's the nature, first of all, of this salvation that is signified by the sprinkling of the water in the Red Sea and by the sprinkling of the waters of baptism? What is it? We may say that it is the saving work of God, cleansing his elect but sinful children from all their sins. Of saving them from the guilt and the penalty and the punishment of those sins. And saving them from the power and dominion of those sins. Cleansing them from the filth and the defilement and the guilt of sin. That's what this salvation consists of. That was the idea of deliverance through the baptism of the children of Israel in the Red Sea. Understand that. On the one side of the Red Sea, where they came from, they are in Egypt. They are in the bondage of Egypt. And we all know that the bondage of that Egypt is a sign of the dominion and power of sin. Not only that, on that side of Egypt, they are defiled with that sin. That sin is a great temptation to them, but it's also in them. On the one side, they are really no longer a separate people unto the Lord. There they are mingled with the children of Egypt so much that they were in danger of being one. A picture, that outside of baptism, We are in the world. We are part of the world. We are defiled with the sins of the world. They are on us. They are through us. They are in us. And we need to be cleansed and separated from those sins. And baptism is a sign of that cleansing and that washing away of the filth of sin. And it really is a picture of the very three things that we read in the baptism form. I really cannot do any better than that. You know the baptism form. You probably know it by heart. It lays out a second and a third, and the first thing it sets forth are depravity, what we are by nature. What was Israel on the other side of Egypt? Who were they? What did they become in their 400 years there in Egypt? They were slaves. They were bound to sin. That's all they could do is sin. It's a sign of depravity. It's a sign of total depravity that so seizes our heart, mind, soul, and will that all we can do is sin. We are prone to hate God and our neighbor in everything that we do. We are of the world and in the world. Then it goes on to talk about our deliverance. And it sets forth that deliverance according to the three persons of the being of God. what God Himself has ordained, what God has decided to do, His election of His people, His choosing of them, His giving of them to His Son for salvation. It sets forth the promises of God to avert all evil or turn it to their profit, that is, to deliver them when in sin and in bondage. It is the deliverance of salvation through Jesus Christ who gives himself to death to shed his blood as a payment for their sins, to atone for those sins. And that blood then as a power to forgive them, to deliver them from the guilt of sin, and to deliver them also from sin's power. And then the application of that blood by the Holy Spirit The application of that blood, such that we are indeed made righteous before God, God imputes to us the very righteousness of Christ by faith. And then the Holy Spirit sanctifies us, actually cleansing us from that filth and that dominion of sin. The result is that, thirdly, we live in love. toward God and toward the neighbor. That's it. That's what this salvation consists of. That's the parts of it. That's the totality of it. We could say more about how there is in that salvation really the granting and the giving of the very life of Jesus Christ himself to his people, an eternal life whereby they dwell with him where He is their God and they are His people forever and ever perfectly without sin. But in essence, it is the three parts, the three principal parts of the doctrine of holy baptism simply and clearly and plainly laid out in our baptism form. This is what God does to His church when He saves His church, and this is what God does to His people when He saves them through baptism. You pass through the Red Sea. And God works that principally when He regenerates us by His Spirit, when He implants His Spirit in our heart, joining us to Jesus Christ. In that regeneration, we are washed and cleansed. We are separated from sin so that we are holy before God. He destroys sin, and He redestroys the enemies of sin, so that they have no dominion over the people of God. It's all pictured there in this deliverance through the Red Sea. Once that Red Sea closed in upon Pharaoh and his host, that must have been an event all by itself. Don't overlook that in this whole thing. how often God says, I will be honored in Pharaoh and his host. It wasn't enough that God simply save his people. That was an amazing thing all by itself, but God will save his people before all the world. And Pharaoh and his host, he brings to their knees. They see this great salvation of God for his people, all there. Baptism is a sign and seal of that great work of Jesus Christ shedding his blood such that our confession is so bold as to say that Jesus Christ himself is the water of the Red Sea. It is the application of the very blood of Jesus Christ. It is, as we read in our form, the incorporation of us into Jesus Christ so that We enjoy the benefits of both his death and his resurrection. It's even another point that could be brought out here, even. It's amazing when you look at this, amazed when I look at this history, how it brings you to Christ. You start out by looking at the history, and you see this salvation, and of course you see and know this salvation is by Christ, and you don't really think of it. of Christ even being the water of the Red Sea, such is the connection of Christ to this salvation. And then, if you look in 1 Corinthians 10, you will notice, even in that section that we quote, that Israel was baptized unto Moses. Unto Moses. Did you notice that? That's shocking language. The idea is they were baptized into Moses, as it were, and unto Moses. You say, well, how can that be? And the answer is, well, Moses stood there also as a type of Christ. Everything here is a type of Christ. Moses in that great rod, both parting the Red Sea, making the passage, and then collapsing the Red Sea so that it is a barrier between the people of God and the nation of Egypt. There Christ is in the Shekinah, in that pillar of cloud and fire. He's all through the event and everywhere in the event. And that brings us to the second great significance. It pertains not only to the nature of this salvation, what it's all about, that it's all about sin, all about deliverance, complete deliverance of the people of God from the bondage of Egypt and its house. But notice the emphasis is upon the fact that it is God's work and God's work alone. That's what screams out in the passage. When you look at it from the perspective of man, there is nothing here of man. God places them in this position where they are, first of all, delivered by ten plagues, so that they are loosed from Egypt in a certain sense. And then to drive home the point, God places them right there in a trap, where every single person, apart from faith now, looking with the carnal eyes of man, Looking according to the standards of man, according to the wisdom of man, says it is utterly hopeless. There is no escape here from that foe and from being brought back under the bondage of that foe. Everything makes it hopeless. God alone saves here. This is the significance even of the parting of the Red Sea as a miracle. That's minimized, even rejected today. The fact that God used an east wind conjures up all kinds of natural explanations. Well, the sea must not have been very deep there. It must have been more like a swamp, so that a good, strong east wind that blows up, which God did, of course, by His ordinary providence, would have made it somewhat a nice path for Israel to pass through. It really wasn't dry ground. It was probably pretty swampy yet. It did, after all, take off though the wheels of the chariots, etc., etc., but all those are attempt to deny and reject the very thing that is being brought out here in the history. To bring up such explanations not only impugns the infallibility of the Holy Scriptures, but impugns that salvation is the work of God and God alone. Yes, God uses an east wind, but God uses a miraculous east wind. Outside of his ordinary providence, as it were, this dividing of the Red Sea is unique, never to be performed. Walls of water? How about walls of water that part upon the command of Moses and the use of his rod, or collapsing again with that rod? That must have been an event. What do you think was going through the mind of Pharaoh and his hosts in the Red Sea? Don't forget, that's what God wants them to testify. Such is the salvation of God that God will have that proclaimed, not only by His people willingly, as they will do, but He will have it proclaimed by even the ungodly wicked, such as Pharaoh, with their hard hearts. What do they testify there in the middle of the Red Sea? Let us turn back. Let us flee. What did they see there in the Red Sea? They saw God. God glaring at them in that pillar of cloud that stands between the nation of Israel and the nation of Egypt. God looking at them and his hatred and his disgust and his just judgment. And God looking with such a look, he's tearing off the wheels of their chariots. He's turning all their power and all their might into nothing. So they say, let us flee. Let us flee for the Lord fights for them. Even the ungodly must acknowledge that this is the work of God and of God alone. What a shame then when we would ignore that or not recognize that. God will have his name confessed as Lord. God will have his name confessed as Savior. God did not give his son to the death of the cross. God did not baptize his people in their blood, in his blood, only to have them confess. Well, we contributed in part. We did, after all, walk through the Red Sea. No, all of it, all of it from beginning to end is the work of God, the saving work of God, and the saving work of God and God alone. That's the truth that the children of Israel must confess. That really is the blessing of all this too. That's the intended purpose of God with all this truth. Simply turn to the next page in your Bible, read chapter 15, and what do you see? There's the nation of Israel. God has brought them through an impossible place. God has closed the Red Sea. God has shut the eyes. those murderous black eyes of their enemies. He has taken all their swords and spears and all their chariots and placed them at the bottom of the Red Sea where they're going to rot. Already now the bodies of the ungodly wicked are washing up on the shore. And what does Israel do? We have the song of Moses. We have the song of the people of Israel. We have the song that they made. They praise God. The song is the praise of God from one end into the other. I will sing unto the Lord, for he has triumphed gloriously. The Lord is my strength. The Lord is my song. The Lord has become my salvation. Notice, the Lord is my salvation. He doesn't simply save, but He is your salvation. In other words, they are brought to faith, and by that faith they praise and glorify and worship God with all their being. That's the blessing. Not all believed. Sadly, that was the case also. There's something else about this history, something else that 1 Corinthians 10 also brings out and brings to our attention that we cannot overlook. I would not have you ignorant how that our fathers were under the cloud and all passed through the sea. They all were sprinkled with that water, but with many of them God was not well pleased, for they were overthrown in the wilderness. That is, they had no faith. Perhaps they looked at that water and with a sort of superstitious presumption trusted in the water itself, blind to the type, blind to the fact that this is all the work of God. That's what unbelief is. Same happens in the church today. That's why the warning is given in the New Testament. There is, in the church, those who are sprinkled with the water, who receive the water, who received the sign of that salvation in the water. Perhaps they believe, yes, indeed, I was baptized with that water, but they were not saved. That's shown and demonstrated by the fact that they had no faith, not real faith in the reality. And how is that evident in their lives, in their lives? No praise and worship to Jehovah God for this salvation, but continual praise and honor of themselves. Not living a sanctified life unto God, returning all their heart, mind, and soul and strength to God for his great salvation of them, but wallowing in the same sins of Egypt. As Israel did, continually wanting to go back not entering into the land because of unbelief, and they fell in the wilderness. God was not well pleased. That's a warning, beloved, to you and I. The sign is there. The sign is real. It's a real seal unto us and to our children that God saves his own, that God saves his people, that God saves his people to the uttermost And our lives are a testimony of that. Then there's the testimony of unbelief that we need to reckon with. It's not without reason that the Psalms bring that up. Even as God is delivering them, they provoke God at the Red Sea. And they provoke God after the Red Sea. The people whom God delivers, the people whom God gives that reality signified in baptism, signified by the Red Sea, believe in Him. What does that mean? Do you believe that God is able to deliver you from your sin, or do you doubt that? When sin appears in your life, and it will, that old depraved nature is still there, do you live in unbelief or belief with regard to that sin? Do you believe that God indeed delivers us to the uttermost? It's an important question. It's an important question. Because the reality is, God does. God will. If you believe that, then there's only one thing to do then, isn't there? That's praise Him. Praise Him alone. Give unto Him the glory and honor. That's the very blessing of that salvation. It's the very evidence of that salvation. So beloved, let us heed that warning also. That worrying about passing through the waters, even of baptism, and that with many God is not well pleased. Calling to you is to believe in this Jehovah God, to believe in this Christ, to believe in his salvation, and give unto him all the honor and glory. Amen. Let us pray. Our Father, which art in heaven, strengthen our faith, Father, forgive our unbelief, help us in our unbelief. We believe that thou wilt grant these things, that thou wilt use thy very word and the power of thy word to continually watch over and care for us in our own wilderness journey on the way to the promised land. Open our eyes continually to the joys and the wonders of the kingdom of heaven. praise and honor Thee for this great salvation without which we are in the bondage of sin. We pray, Father, these things for Jesus' sake and in His name, amen.