Evangelist DeGarde, Ron DeGarde was here. He preached from this passage and shared a book. It's a book that I have bought in multitude of copies and give out all the time to people that are hurting. I wanted to go back to this chapter and just to pull out some more thoughts and some more details from this. It's been a couple years and the nature of of a pastor's job is that he's helping people who are going through need. Typically, and I understand this, but typically if everything's going good, you don't call me. And that's fine. That's good. I understand that. But if things are starting to go bad, you're starting to have a crisis or a problem or a situation that you need some counsel or help or direction or a prayer for, then you call me. And so I I'm working from burden to burden to burden, and thank goodness it's not always the same people. You all bounce out of them, and things go better for a while, and we praise the Lord for that, but life is, our spiritual life is full of peaks and valleys and ups and downs. It just seems like a lot of folks right now are going through a lot of burdens. We have a lot, a number of folks in our church that are just dealing with the struggles of life, whether it's health problems or family problems, marriages or finances, your jobs, things like that. The burdens of life have become heavy. So I'm reminded of this passage from the God who saved the Israelites in a grand fashion. as they came to the banks of the Red Sea. There's some principles we can learn from this, and I've used them a lot in individual counseling. I want to use them once again here today as we meet together as a church family, because there's some truths in here that if we hold on to, can see us through the difficult areas of life. Truths here that if we hold on to, can keep us from wavering when life becomes difficult. Nation of Israel, of course, has come to the point that they've been in slavery and in bondage in Egypt now for more than 400 years. They had come to the conclusion, many of them, that God had forgotten them. You know, here they were slaves in Egypt and this was it. They had been left. They had been abandoned. Here they were going to stay. Here generations had been born. They lived. They died. They were slaves to the nation of Egypt. But God had not forgotten them. God had prepared them. God had built them a strong nation, a great nation. They had come in one family, Joseph and his brothers. Right. One family had come and a great nation had been formed after the 10 plagues. And we don't have time to go into the whole 10 plague scenario as Moses came before Pharaoh. Let my people go. The The plagues came and the nation of Egypt were so ready to be done with Israel and to get them out, they loaded them up financially. They gave them precious jewels and their own wealth and their own gemstones and all that they had, whatever, to get them out. And so God had prepared the nation of Egypt to get the nation of Israel out, right? He had brought the plagues, then he had taken them and financially had set them up. So as the nation of Israel has left, they've packed up men, women, children, everything they have. They've been given great financial benefit from the nation of Egypt. They have left Egypt. They have come to the banks of the Red Sea. However, By the time they get to the banks of the Red Sea, the nation of Egypt has had a change of heart, right? We saw that in those first verses down there, verse 4, 5, 6, 7. The nation of Egypt has decided they kind of liked the slave labor, you know. Now there's no one to go tell to mix the bricks. They have to mix the bricks. There's no one to tell to cut the wheat. They have to cut the wheat. And so they've grown accustomed to relying on the Israelites. The Israelites are gone. So the nation of Egypt has now gone to Pharaoh and said, we've changed our mind. The plagues were bad, but I guess they weren't that bad. Go get them back. Go pursue them. And so Pharaoh gets his chariots together because the nation of Egypt is upset and they're distraught. They want the nation of Israel back to be their slaves once again. They pursued them now and they pursued them to the banks of the Red Sea. And as they've come to the banks of the Red Sea, we could do it. And if you've seen the maps, if you've seen the pictures before, they have come to a position here where they are essentially trapped by the geography. It was not by accident. We're going to look at that. It wasn't because they made a blunder or made a wrong turn. It's right where God wanted them to be. But they have come here to this position, and all those names that Pastor Gunther was stumbling through this morning give us some great detail of exactly where they had gotten to, exactly where they were. And it's a position where the beach had kind of merged with a cliff, a bank of mountains, and had converged with the Red Sea, and the nation of Israel had got themselves, if you will, into that point of the triangle where the Red Sea was looming on the one side and the cliff and mountains were looming on the other, and the nation of Egypt was coming right down that valley towards them. They were, the Bible used the word, entangled by the land, right? Stuck. Red Sea on one side, cliff on the other, nation of Egypt and the armies of Egypt ready to destroy them. So I called my message this morning stuck between a rock and a hard place. I don't usually get cute with my message names, but I thought it was appropriate today. They were stuck. They didn't know where to go. They were I mean, you saw the stress level in their complaints as they pursued as they came to Moses. and said, why did you bring us out here? Were there not enough graves? You can see the sarcasm, I think, the belittling as they're talking about it. Were there not enough graves back in Egypt? You brought us out here so we could die out here in the wilderness? You should have left us alone. It would have been better to serve the Egyptians than to die out here in the wilderness. And the people are in great anxiety. And for a good reason. The Egyptians are coming after them strong. the money that they were given, the jewels they were given, they're quite sure are going back, you know? They don't know if they're physically going back, but the money's going back. The armies have come, the cliffs are insurmountable, the Red Sea is a tremendous body of water. What are they going to do? Where are they going to go? And how are they going to get out of this? Now listen, this becomes the defining event for the nation of Israel and all of the surrounding countries. This becomes the defining event in the power of God. This one thing, because in every instance, the nations that they'll meet some 40 years from now as they get into the promised land, they go to they go to Jericho. They find out the people in Jericho know about this. Red Sea, and how they got across the Red Sea, and how it had devoured the nations. This became the defining event. The God that brought them across the Red Sea can surely dot, dot, dot. Right? Whatever it was, this became the event that they always... I find it interesting, and I hope you do too. They didn't go back and say, the God who brought all those plagues killed Deliverus. The God who brought manna from heaven. He'll deliver us. The God who... All those amazing things, they always came back to this event. The God who parted the Red Sea. The God who brought us across the Red Sea. This was a pivotal moment in the nation of Israel. This was a pivotal moment in the power of God in their lives. And they were stuck, folks. The geography had pinned them in and the armies of Pharaoh We're pursuing them. I wrote on my outline there, the Israelites obviously were in a bad place. They were in a bad place, listen, on purpose. On purpose, they were right where God wanted them to be. They hadn't misread the GPS, you know. I just went, Desi and I, Friday went up to see Philip to help him for a night and Saturday we drove back. And we saw him in Massachusetts, up in the Berkshire area of Massachusetts. Anyway, we ran up and back, and so the GPS guided our way, guided our way up. And the GPS doesn't like to be told it's wrong. She's really snippety. Did you notice that? I don't know how they program that thing. But as soon as I don't go the way she wants, it's recalculating. Make immediate U-turn. You know, listen, Moses, obviously, they didn't have GPS, but they knew where they were going. They didn't bungle into this position. They didn't end up there by accident. In fact, it tells us in verse number one, the Lord spake, right? The Lord spake unto Moses, saying, speaking to the children that they turn and encamp where? Right there in that Pyrahirus. between Migdal and the sea. God said, this is where I want you to go right into this position. So they do. Moses leads them into this position, right into this place. And you can see as they're going in, I'm sure the looks on their faces. Right? Look, and the sea is getting closer on the left, and the cliffs are getting closer on the right, and it's converging to a point, and the dust and the thunder of the Pharaoh's armies is gathering momentum behind them. And at some point they must be going, where? How are we getting out of here? You know? There's no gate at the end. There's no boat waiting to take us across the sea. Right? There's no set of stairs up this cliff. We have women and children and our animals and all that we have to try to get across. Where are we going to go? God's taking them to this position. On purpose. Because they're right where God wants them to be. God knew. Where they were. He hadn't forgot them. God didn't say, oh, boy, you're in a pickle now, didn't he? What are we going to do? How are we going to get you out of here? This is all part of God's plan. Listen, often the obstacles that come our way, all part of God's plan. He knows right where we are. He didn't forget us. He didn't abandon us. He knows right where we are. Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I fear no evil. Why? Thou art with me. Thy rod, thy staff, they comfort me. He knows where we are, even in the difficult times, even in the hard places, even when things look really, really difficult. God knows right where we are. And in this instance, God put them there. Maybe you have a place in your life right now. You don't know how in the world you ended up. Now, listen, maybe you're in a place right now And you know every bad decision you made that got you there. Isn't it great that God gets us out of it, no matter whether He put us there on purpose or whether we got there of our own stupidity. And sometimes we get ourselves into the mess. But God doesn't ever say, well, good luck now. When we turn to Him, confess our sin, get things right with Him, God is more than eager to get us back out of the problem. He wants to help us out. He wants to see us through. He wants to get us out of the predicament and back on the right road. God knows where we are and God knows where He wants us to be. At no point does God ever scratch His head and go, now where did they get to? What happened to them? They were right there and they're gone. No, God knows right where we are. And God knew right where the nation of Israel was in this tough predicament. Notice, though, the one thing they had to learn. Was that their ultimate purpose? Was to glorify God. God's ultimate purpose was to be glorified through the situation. That's the ultimate purpose, the ultimate duty of man. Boy, we have a hard time with that, don't we? We do. We think our ultimate purpose is to be happy, to be comfortable. You know, why would God bring this into my life? I'm not comfortable today. I need to get out of this because I'm not happy today. God's purpose in mankind's life was not to make him happy and comfortable, but that God would be glorified. And God said that in verse number four, I will harden Pharaoh's heart. He shall follow. I will be honored upon Pharaoh at the end that they may know that I am the Lord. Verse number 17, at the end of the same passage, we read, Behold, I will harden the heart to the Egyptians. I will get me honor under Pharaoh. Verse 18, the Egyptians shall know that I am the Lord when I have got my honor from Pharaoh. God says this is part of the plan. Again, we see this because we are able to look at this in the past. We see this played out in history. where every other nation that they came up against, without the wonder of internet, iPhones, telephones, or anything, before they got there, those other countries knew far well what had happened at the Red Sea. They knew. Because God had been honored and God had been glorified. because of what happened. This was the ultimate purpose of man. So when I'm faced with that crisis and I'm faced with that situation and things look bleak and things look difficult and I'm in a predicament, how will God be glorified in this? That's the question. That's the solution. I want God to be glorified in my life because of this. So what do we need to fix to make that happen? What do we need to do to make that happen. What do we need to change to make that happen? Because if I'm just trying to get myself comfortable or myself better, I got my motives out of whack, my priorities out of whack. God is to be glorified and in this situation we know how he was and the long-term ramifications of that. Number three, so what's the godly reaction in crisis? What is the godly reaction How am I supposed to respond? The scripture tells us it's not verse 11 and 12. Because in verse 11 and 12, we see the meltdown, right? The people of Israel, the meltdown as they go to Moses, they say, because there were no graves that has taken us to die in the wilderness, wherefore hast thou dealt with us to carry us forth out of Egypt? Is not this the word that we told thee? Listen, verse number 12. Didn't they just give Moses a I told you so? That's what they just said to Moses, right? We told you. We told you so, Moses. Isn't this a word we told you in Egypt saying, let us alone, that we may serve the Egyptians. It's better for us to serve the Egyptians than we should die in the wilderness. They had a meltdown. They had a crisis. They had a listen, a pity party is the word we'd use today, right? They're sitting there. They thought at this particular day, they thought it would be better to spend the rest of their lives in slavery to the Egyptians. Better to have their children and their grandchildren and future generations grow up in slavery than to deal with the predicament that they were in today, which would lead to the promised land where they would have a land of milk and honey, where they would have their own home, where they would be their own people, where they would be their own nation. The problems of today made them so short sighted. And if there's one thing that I would challenge us about as Christians. Listen, we so often get so short sighted in where we're at and in our predicament. Jim Berg has used this illustration in the series on Sunday night, right? We have a windshield view of what's going on, right? We can see out the windshield and we can only see like the car ahead of us. You know, that's about it. God has the helicopter view, right? He can see way, way ahead of us because He's already prepared the way. He's already been there. Right? He made it. He's been there. It's done. He knows. His perspective is different from ours. And we become short-sighted. And the Israelites have become so short-sighted that they came to the point, they said, it'd be better just to be slaves. Let's just stay there. We'll keep making bricks for the Egyptians the rest of our lives. We'll live in the little shantytowns outside as the slaves do. We'll just live there. That's fine. They were willing to accept it. Sometimes the hard things take character to get through. I mean, you've got to dig deep to get to where God wants you to be. You've got to overcome obstacles to get to where God wants you to be. The easy way out is usually not the best way. And the easy way for the Israelites were basically, let's just see if we can surrender, go back and make bricks for generations to come. We'll do that. Moses said, no, no, no. God brought us here. Remember the plagues. Remember what happened. God has a plan. God brought us here. God did not bring the Israelites to this part right here by the Red Sea for them to die. He didn't bring them there for that. His purpose was not that they would be slaughtered. His purpose was not that somehow God would be glorified in their death. This was not it today. This was not his purpose today. His purpose was to show the power and majesty of the Almighty God. that Pharaoh would remember, the Egyptians would remember, and countries for generations from now would remember what happened this day on the banks of the Red Sea. So, they had a meltdown in verse 11, 12. That's not the right reaction. What is the right reaction? We have four specific phrases used here in these two verses. Verse 13, Moses said, Fear ye not. Fear has no place in this situation. We are where God told us to be. Again, I think a good parallel is the story I like to use so often from the New Testament. Jesus tells the disciples, let's get on the boat, we're going to go to the other side of the sea. As they're going across the sea, Jesus goes down into the hold of the boat, the lower section of the boat goes to sleep. The boat's tossed to and fro by the waves and the disciples are scared. They're scared and they come down to wake the master and the master corrects them. He says to them, where is your faith? Again, I think. I think if I was a disciple, I would have been stunned for a moment. Because I thought when I'm in a crisis, I should run to the master. And when they were in a crisis and thought they were going to drown, they went right to Jesus and said, Jesus, we're scared. But Jesus said, where is your faith? Why? Because Jesus had told him when they got on the boat, we are going to go to the other side. And halfway across, they were scared they weren't going to make it. So who did they doubt? They doubted the master, right? They doubted the Lord. They doubted whether or not they would. Jesus said, we're going to the other side. By golly, if Jesus says we're going to the other side, we're going to the other side. Right. We can have confidence in that. We can know for sure that we don't have to wonder. We don't have to be worried about it. Now, Moses is in the same predicament. Moses is there and they're at the place that stuck place between the cliffs and the Red Sea. And Moses says, wait, fear not. Why? Because the Lord said, I'm going to deliver you. He wasn't wasting time on those plagues. He wasn't wasting time trying to get you out here. If God says we're going to go across the Red Sea or get to the promised land, they didn't know they were going to cross the Red Sea yet. Right. Not yet. We know that they didn't know that God said you're going to the promised land and the promised lands on the other side of that Red Sea. How are they going to get there? They don't know. But God said they're going there. So if they're going there, they're going to go there. Fear not. God tells us, I am with you always. Even to the end of the world. He is always with us, he said, I will never leave thee, I will never forsake thee. And when the difficult times come, we start to tremble and we start to get concerned and we start to fear, and I believe the command from then The nation of Israel and the banks of the Red Sea, all the way to the disciples in the boat crossing the sea of Galilee, all the way to today. The command's the same. Fear not. I'm with you. Fear not. I'm in control. Fear not. I know right where you are. No need to be scared. No need to be worried. No need to be concerned. God says, I have you. I'm with you always. Number two. He told him to fear not and to stand still. Stand still. Why? And see the salvation of the Lord. Moses had got it now. Right. Moses had been through this. Moses grew through this. Remember the fiery bush when this idea first was delivered to Moses? Fiery bush. God told Moses, you're going to go into Pharaoh and tell him to let my people go. And Moses said, Lord, I can't do that. I'm not a good talker. I can't speak. I stutter. I stammer. I'm not a good talker. I can't go. I'm not going. God says, all right, I'll send Aaron with you, but you're still going to go, right? I'll send a spokesman with you, but you're still going to go. Tell him I am. Moses had to learn this faith, this trust, this believing Moses had been there. Now it's Moses's job to teach the people and the people are scared. They are having a meltdown. They wish they were still slaves. Moses comes to them and says, listen, we just need to stand still and see the salvation of the Lord. Why did Moses tell him to stand still? I think because there were no other options. There was nothing else they could do. Moses didn't say how many have swimming lessons, you know, because you're going to get in and start swimming to the other side now. No. You know, how many of you climb? You know, did you bring your rappelling ropes? No, they're not going to be cliff climbing and they're not going to swim the Red Sea. What are they going to do? They don't have chariots. They don't have weapons. They're not going to fight. So Moses said, you know what we're going to do? This is where God brought us. We are out of our options. And so we're going to stand here and see what God's going to do, because now it's up to God. What a blessing that is. There are some times I think you and I, we just keep coming up with new solutions. We just keep coming up with new ways. We stay awake all night pondering new solutions to the problems that have come into our life. And I know this because I do it too, you know. And I sit there and I think and I plan and I come up with solution A, B and C. And what are we going to do if this happens? What happens if that happens? And God says, you know, when you're out of options, God says, let me know, you know. Because I have a plan. You are where I put you and I have a plan to get you out of it. So why don't you stop coming up with solutions and let God do it? Moses had that advice. Fear not. Stand still and see the salvation of the Lord. Wow. Letter E on your outline there, verse number 14. He reminds them, the Lord shall fight for you and ye shall hold your peace. Hold your peace. Settle down. Right. This is what he's saying. Settle down. Calm down. You're crying. You're all in an uproar. You're making irrational choices right now. You'd rather be a slave than be free. What are you thinking now? Hold your peace. Stand down. Watch what the Lord's going to do and keep your peace. That's the advice Moses had for the nation of Israel. It parallels the advice that Jesus had for the disciples on the boat crossing the Sea of Galilee. Where's your faith? He turns to the sea, peace, be still. And the next thing you know, the boat that they were in got to the other side. Isn't that amazing? That was the plan from the beginning. Nothing had changed as far as God was concerned. God knew the storm was coming up. God knew what was coming. The storm was just a little bump along the way. Verse 15. I love what the Lord says here. Verse 15, the Lord said unto Moses, wherefore cryest unto me? Speak unto the children of Israel that they go forward. Forward? Lord, we're kind of stuck, you know? Lord, we're kind of getting bunched in here. There's at least a million of us. And by most counts, we know that there was about a million men. So a million men, roughly a million women plus children, three to four million people. Roughly at this point, there's millions of people. They're stuck in this in this in this place that's coming to a key that's coming to a close. The cliffs are converging with the sea. There's nowhere else to go. Lord says, why don't you just keep moving forward, forward? You know, we're going to get wet soon. Keep moving forward, he says. Don't worry, he says, just keep moving forward. That's why your pastor's advice. Every time people come into my office and they're having a crisis and their life's falling apart and their marriage is in turmoil and their families imploding. I said, you know what? Tomorrow you're going to have to get up and put one foot in front of the other. Keep moving forward. It's what the Lord told him to do. Right. Just keep moving forward. Don't don't don't give up. Don't throw up your hands in despair. You're going to stand here and see what the Lord is going to do. But tomorrow you got to get up and go about your regular business. And their job was to just keep moving on. It's coming to a close, Lord. Keep moving on. But look, it doesn't look good. I mean, things are really convert. Keep keep moving forward. I'll take care of it for you. Verse 19, we haven't read this yet, so let's get into the conclusion of this. 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. It came between the camp of the Egyptians and the camp of Israel. It was a cloud and darkness to them, but it gave light by night to these so that one came not near the other all the night. So the angel of the Lord that had been leading them, that pillar of fire by night, that pillar of cloud by day that was in front of them, that was leading them where they should go, that was leading them right to this position, now removed itself and came behind them. This mass of cloud and light, an unusual combination, came behind them. So that on the Egyptian side of this, it was darkness and cloudy and they couldn't see anything, right? The fog rolled in really thick on the Egyptian army. But on the other side, the Israelites had light. They were preparing. They were able to see what was going on. God used this unique divine arrangement to divide the two, to put a barrier between the two. The Egyptians were not going to attack. the Israelites that day. They were not going to come in and attack them overnight because the weather conditions, I'm saying what the Egyptians would say, right? The weather conditions made it unfavorable. Well, it was God that had done this. He brought the angel between them. He put a defense between them. There's a pillar of cloud there before them. They can't see anything. The darkness was impeding their progress. They were done. They were going to wait till morning. Meanwhile, there's light for the Israelites, right? There's light on that side. There's brightness on that side. It's divided the two armies. God had brought this division between them, verse 20. came between the camp, the Egyptians, the camp of Israel. It was a cloud and darkness to them. Verse 21. Then 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. The waters were divided. Notice what happened. A unique, listen, weather event directly from the hand of God. All night, the winds blew. Now, I don't mean to pick on the Charleston Heston movie, but it didn't just open up, right? It didn't just open up like we like to see in the movies. That makes for, I guess, a quicker movie experience or more exciting. But the wind started to blow. And as the wind started to blow and as the wind started to blow all night, the Bible says all night, the water started to move back. and started to move back, and started to build up this wall of water, and started to move it out of the way, until suddenly there was dry land down through the middle of this. It had dried the land. The wind was such an intense wind, such a strong wind, such a powerful wind, because it was from God that God reversed the laws of physics to move the water aside to let the dry land appear so that the nation of Israel, with that cloud and barrier behind them, just started walking. Because the Lord said, go forward. Where? Well, the path I'm going to open, God says, right? the path I'm making. You don't see it, but God already saw it. It's already there. I'm just moving the water out of the way for you. Isn't that great? So God starts to move the water out of the way all night. Took a while, right? Moved this great amount of water out of the way, dried the land, and the nation of Israel began to march across the sea. Now, the Egyptians in the story don't look to be the brightest of guys. Because they follow them, right? As soon as the daylight comes, as soon as the cloud has lifted, as soon as the darkness is lifted, they're looking out there. If I was the Egyptians, I would have said, now, remember the plagues we just had? Remember what God did to all the different weather events back in Egypt? I don't think I'm going in there, though probably we would agree the Egyptian army didn't have a choice. They were told where to go and they went. The commanding officer said, pursue. So they pursued, right? The water has moved back for the Israelites. It'll stay back for you. I'm sure they told him. And the Egyptians begin to pursue. But by the time the Israelites have reached the other side, the wind has died down and the water has moved back. And the Egyptian army is caught, drowned in the middle of the Red Sea. Now, listen. Scientists today as well as theologians, unfortunately, today love to try to discount the parting of the Red Sea. It seems impossible. It seems too, too difficult of a thing. It seems crazy that this big Red Sea and the Red Sea is a massive body of water that God would have opened it up and parted the Red Sea. That sounds like a good story for Sunday school. They say, but not really fact. Theologians today have tried to redefine it. Maybe the Bible didn't need Red Sea. It probably meant the Reed Sea. The Reed Sea you could have walked across. Can I back up a minute? I don't think the Israelites, I don't think the Israelites were crazy. I think if the Israelites had gotten to the Reed Sea, they wouldn't have panicked. They wouldn't have wanted to be slaves. They would have kept walking. I walked with Philip on the trail a few times. We walked through ankle-deep water a few times, you know. I didn't stop and panic. I kept walking. If the Israelites had gotten to the Reed Sea with the armies of Pharaoh behind them, they would have kept walking through the Reed Sea, but they were concerned and distraught. They were at their wits' end because they were up against the Red Sea, Big Sea. If God had allowed him to cross the Reed Sea, then when they would have got to the walls of Jericho, the people of Jericho wouldn't have been scared. Rahab wouldn't have believed. If it would have just been the Reed Sea, because who cares? Kids skip through the Reed Sea every day. The Reed Sea is not a big body of water. It wouldn't have made a difference. to the nations around them. God wouldn't have been glorified if they would have just crossed the Reed Sea. But they didn't cross the Reed Sea, folks. The Bible says they crossed the Red Sea. Big body of water, major obstacle, big problem. That's why some now, 4,000 years later, you and I can open the Word of God and read this account and find confidence and faith in it. Why? Because my God was big enough to get the Israelites across the Red Sea. He moved a wall of water to get them across the Red Sea when they were out of options and there was no more hope. God moved water in the Red Sea for them to get across the Red Sea. What an amazing thing. And I don't know about you, but someday in heaven, when we're together, I want to ask people about that. Right. I wonder how was that? What was that like? How? The Red Sea is such a big body of water. By the time you walk in one side, you can't quite see the other. This is a major event, a major thing. God did something big for them so that for the rest of their history, they could save the God who parted the Red Sea for us. He will see us through this as well. And so that you and I, when we come to obstacles in our life, go, you know what? It's probably not as big as parting the Red Sea. Probably not as big as having the whole army of the Egyptians behind us. While we're trying to get across the Red Sea on dry land, not that big. I think God can handle my problem too. Because a God that's big enough to move water off the floor of the Red Sea, is a God that's big enough to handle my crisis. He can handle my financial problem. He can handle my marriage problem. He can handle my rebellious child. He can handle my situation that's come into my life. Whatever it is. Whatever your problem is. The God who handled the Red Sea can handle me too. And so as we come to the crisis in our lives and the difficulties in our life, we don't have to worry. We don't have to be scared because the God who put the Israelites there knew where they were and had a plan to get them out. They didn't know it until they needed to. They didn't have it until the opportunity opened itself. You and I struggle because God wants us to walk by faith, not by sight. We struggle with that. We want sight. Right. We want to know the where, the when, the why. We want to know where we're going. I'm telling you, you know, I'm I'm telling you, I'm preaching to myself because I'm the backup plan, backup plan guy. You know, I had to drive up to the border of New York and Massachusetts to meet Phil just Friday night. So I put my Atlas in the car, I programmed my GPS, and then I went on Google and wrote down the directions. I had three ways to get there, no matter what. I knew where I was going. That's the way I like things, right? Isn't that the way you like things? A backup plan of a backup plan. I'm not just getting in the car and turning left and hoping I find Massachusetts, you know? Because I might not, you know? So I have plans. I have maps. I have electronics and paper. You know, no matter what, I'm going to find Massachusetts. That's the way we want life to be. But God didn't take the Israelites into the wilderness and say, OK, here you go. Electronic maps. Paper maps, digital maps, we got it all. No matter what, you'll find it. Good luck. See you on the other side. God didn't do that. God led them in and God led them across. And there were times when it looked precarious and it looked difficult. In fact, it looked downright impossible. And God said, I'm still leading. I'm still guiding. Just keep moving forward. I have it, God says. Oh, to walk by faith and not by sight. So difficult for us. Listen, those obstacles that have come your way. God knows where you are. God has you right where he wants you. You know, the nation of Israel after this, after this. Centuries after this event, nation of Israel fell into sin. God put them into slavery again. Right. Babylonians took half of them. The nations from the South came and took them away. Northern Kingdom fell, then the Southern Kingdom fell. They're all back in bondage again. You know what God said? I will take you out of it. There was hope at the end. I will not forget you down there. I will get you back out of it again. That was, listen, self-imposed problems. They got themselves into the mess. Why? Because they forgot the God that parted the Red Sea. They forgot Him. They started chasing other gods, false gods, self-imposed wealth and thoughts and their own might. They started chasing themselves. They forgot God. The God that brought them across the Red Sea, they'd forgotten. The next thing you know, they're in bondage again. And yet again, God says, I know where you are, and I will get you out, and I will not forget you. And I will get you back to the promised land again. Isn't that amazing? So as we sit here today, I'm sure some of you are like, yeah, God may know where I am, but it was my own dumb fault that got me into it. Israelites have been there, too, right? God gave us those stories, too, where they got themselves into the mess and God brought them out, not without scars. Sure, there were scars, right? Sure, there was hurt. And yes, it took time. But God brought him back out, too, because God doesn't take us where he forgets us and leaves us. He gets us back out. I hope as you come across obstacles in your life, you can look at the Red Sea and say, the God who brought the Israelites across the Red Sea, that's bigger than my problem. He's powerful enough to handle my problem, too.