Brick Making

Good morning! It’s good to see all of you on this holiday weekend. So glad to have you here.

My name is Tim, I get to be one of the pastors and staff members and if I haven’t had a chance to meet you, maybe this is your first time or you’ve been coming the last couple of weeks, I’ll be in the middle of the West Lobby after the service and if you wouldn’t mind just coming up and introducing yourself, it just gives me an opportunity for thanking you for joining us for worship today. I want to say hi to all of those that are joining online or maybe you’re streaming in later on demand. A special thank you and hello to all of our friends that are at First Lutheran in Algonac.

Today’s a special day for them because not only are they joining us for worship, but after the service they’re going to be making sandwiches for one of our sister congregations that we share with them, Family of God that’s in Detroit. So can we give them a hand this morning? And church is so cool to be partnered with other congregations, especially ones that are mission-minded like we are and want to go out and serve our community. One last thing because last week many of you were here, you might remember we celebrated our birthday.

We really like making a big deal about our birthday here at Shepherds Gate and remember we said hey if there’s any founding members or their families with us and at the 11 nobody stood and you guys all giggled. Well they’re here today so I didn’t want to go another week without recognizing you and well it’s nice that you guys are all in the same row. So Donna, Marilyn, Rachel, could you guys stand so we could… Rachel I know you don’t want to but go ahead and do it.

We love you. Thank you for sacrificing and starting this church. Amen.

Alright so if you are new we are in a series of messages on Exodus and this is actually week 7 of the first part that we’re going through of the first 12 chapters and so if you haven’t been able to join us and you want to catch up you can go on our website you can get all of the messages there. Some people do this with TV shows. What is it called when you do this? Binge watching.

So you can actually think about this binge watch sermons and you’ll catch up right away but we are going to be looking at chapter 5 today. Our main character Moses he’s now with his brother Aaron. Last week we left off this was the end of chapter 4 where Moses and Aaron they they met each other up on a mountain they’ve now made it all the way back to Egypt and the first thing they did was they went back to their people so the people of God which are the Israelites.

These are the people that have been enslaved for 400 years and so they get together with the elders they tell them everything that God has told them and perform miracles in front of them to prove that they actually are from God and that God wants to deliver them out of this bondage of slavery and what’s really remarkable is they actually respond by believing Moses and Aaron and then out of that outflow they worship God which was really powerful and that’s how we ended last week. Sometimes there’s cliffhangers to these messages and so you gotta come back the next week and so it was nice, wasn’t it nice last week to end without a cliffhanger? It was nice just to end on a high note. I can’t promise you that’s going to happen this week okay? So if you have your Bibles we encourage you to bring your Bibles you want to go and open to Exodus chapter 5 we’re going to be reading through most of chapter 5 today.

Exodus chapter 5 verse 1 where it says this after they met with the elders of the Israelites Moses and Aaron now we’re going to go and have a conversation with Pharaoh so they go to Pharaoh and they say this is what the Lord God of Israel says let’s say this together, so powerful isn’t it? So they made so that they may hold a festival to me in the wilderness. Now some of you you grew up in the 60s and 70s any of you want to admit that here today? And you might remember a song if you were in Sunday school back then that started with the words Pharaoh Pharaoh oh yeah let my people go. I don’t know how to sing it I didn’t I was an infant in the 70s okay so I’m an 80s 90s baby I’m a Gen Xer all of us Gen Xers the five of us that are here okay so think about this this song was actually a parody do you know what the song was a parody from? Saturday Night Live is a good guess because this is what Christians do we take things and we attach Jesus to them and we just claim them for our own we do this with Christmas and Easter if you didn’t know that all the things we do at Christmas and Easter were pagan things and we just said oh nope now they’re gonna be about Jesus it was Louie Louie you guys know the song Louie Louie? So that’s the song they ripped off and then turned into a Sunday school song which some of you know so let my people go this is the first time that we’re gonna see this in Exodus we’re gonna see this a whole lot in the future if some of you were wondering why the SG kids logo is on this slide because this is actually their memory verse for today so that’s a cue to the parents that have their kids in our kids program also special this week is we’re actually gonna have pictures for you so here’s a really cool picture to describe what we just read our new pastor Eric when we were rehearsing this on Thursday morning he said Tim you really got to bring in some pictures for the people that are visual so if you’re a visual person these there’s this is one of four pictures I have for you today you can thank Eric after the service and my mistake I should have done this a long time ago I guess I just didn’t know that Pharaoh was so ripped I just and we put this into chat GPT and this is what chat GPT says Pharaoh looks like like he’s not enslaved he’s not helping with the brick making but clearly he has a gym at his disposal and of course no one’s gonna you know argue that Moses gotta have white hair with a white beard because why wouldn’t he and his brother Aaron is just the cool other brother so they go to Pharaoh because that’s what they’re told to do by God you flashback to Exodus chapter 3 God specifically told them this is what you are to say the Lord God the God of the Hebrews has met with us you tell Pharaoh that I have met with you let us take a three-day journey this is important into the wilderness to offer sacrifices to the Lord our God now it’s so interesting is this whole idea of a festival it actually means taking a pilgrimage means they’re gonna go out from where they’re at it’s gonna take three days to get there they then have to perform the sacrifices and be part of the festival and then of course it’s gonna take three days to get back so they’re asking for a week maybe even up to two weeks of vacation scandalous isn’t it no one should ever take a week of vacation no one should ever take that much time off especially if you’re enslaved and it’s this religious festival that obviously involves sacrificing and worship now a lot of people in our day and age they will go on a religious festival or they’ll do kind of a journey one of these things when they go to the Holy Land so people will go to trips go on trips to Israel and I don’t know if any of you have that on your bucket list or not I had the opportunity to go several years ago and what was intriguing is for me and just my personality is that I’m not only just taking in the biblical site of where they believe a miracle or a historical event happened that Jesus may or may not have been part of I also equally take in all of the people around me and you can imagine there’s people from all over the world that flood Israel and some people on this pilgrimage I mean they’re weeping they’re crying they’re down on their hands and their knees they have crosses you know our Catholic friends they’re doing the rosary they’re kissing things like it’s a very spiritual moment some people will actually take spiritual journeys if they want to just get away for a weekend so they might go up north to a cottage and they’ll turn off the technology and they’ll just spend that time in prayer and devotion to the Lord but the fact that God is telling them to say this with these specific parameters you’re gonna be gone for three days and it’s gonna be a festival and there’s going to be sacrifices offered to me well verse two is how Pharaoh responds he says who is the Lord that I should obey him and let Israel go I do not know the Lord and I will not let Israel go well of course he doesn’t know God because he thinks he’s God and it’s been passed down from generation to generation he literally has everything at his disposal he has all of the wealth he has the kingdom he’s using the Israelites as servants and slaves to continue to expand his kingdom which is why they oppress them and so why would he ever believe in God or want anything that he would have to submit to outside of himself or maybe here’s another way to ask this this morning have you ever struggled to explain something spiritual to someone who doesn’t believe in God and aren’t those fun conversations when you say I’ve been in the Bible I’ve been going to church I’ve been praying and I really think God wants me to do this and you have people that say no no no no there’s no way that’s crazy talk there’s that can’t be possible because you haven’t taken into account the earthly factors the things that that you need to make sure that you take care of before you take this leap of faith which is why it’s called faith it’s trusting God and the promptings and the leadings that he has for your life I’ll give you an example when I was a student minister here I was blessed to be able to do it for several years and there was kids in the student program that felt called into ministry they felt like like God was calling them into full-time church work some of them even to be missionaries and some of them are actually serving as missionaries now we praise God for that but I can tell you there was there was times when it got pretty heated with their parents because the kid would come to youth group or they’d go on a retreat they would go home and they would tell their parents I really feel God is calling me to go into ministry and the next call would be the parent to me and they would say to me what did you do to my kid what did you say to them you need to tell them that they’re just being an emotional response to a youth group or to a retreat they don’t really want to go into ministry we already have their future planned out for them we know the degree we want them to have we know the school that we already saved up for them to go to in fact we can’t wait for them to get married we’ve even told them how many grandkids we want and it’s a very awkward conversation isn’t it and that’s what happens sometimes even within the church community let alone people that don’t know Jesus and you’re trying to explain to them spiritual matters or maybe as the Word of God puts it the gospel is actually foolishness to those who are perishing it doesn’t always add up or make sense but this is why they said these words in verse 3 the God of the Hebrews has met with us now let us take this three-day journey into the wilderness so we can offer the sacrifices to the Lord our God so Moses and Aaron say exactly what God told them to say in chapter 3 but then they do something kind of interesting they decide to add a little bit more to the statement and they say this to Pharaoh or he may strike us with plagues or with the sword why did they add this does God need us to add anything to his narrative does God ever need our help in anything other than when if he tells you to speak speak it and I kind of find this fascinating I think this is human nature that when you’re in a tense situation you can imagine this is the first time that they’re before Pharaoh they’re trying to help Pharaoh out they’re like dude you don’t understand he is the King of Kings he is Lord of Lords this is God Almighty and if you don’t go along with what he tells you to do it’s not just gonna be bad for you it’s gonna be bad for your kingdom in fact it’s gonna be bad for all of us they try to associate themselves with Pharaoh unfortunately it doesn’t work because the king of Egypt says Moses and Aaron why are you taking the people away from their labor get back to your work and so Pharaoh said look the people of the land are now numerous and you are just and you are stopping them from working because in his warped twisted mind he believes that these people exist for his benefit that they are just throwaways I mean this is the same you know family that threw babies into the Nile and murder him like he has no regard for human life and so you can imagine Moses and Aaron leaving this situation with Pharaoh in the back of their minds they know what God has already promised in the back of their minds they know that God said when you go and approach him he’s gonna tell you no in fact he’s gonna tell you no over and over and over again it’s not gonna be until you get to the last plague that he’s finally gonna come around likewise you also have Pharaoh’s mind and Pharaoh is just hearing this for the first time and so he’s processing this and because he’s an egotistical maniac this is what he does the same day not the next day not the next week not the next month the same day he gives this order to the slave drivers and the overseers in charge of the people you are no longer to supply the people with straw for making bricks let them go and gather their own straw but require them to make the same number of bricks as before don’t reduce the quota they are lazy this is why they are crying out let us go and sacrifice to our God make the work harder for the people so they keep working and pay no attention to these lies now can I ask you this morning how many of you are motivated when someone calls you lazy how many of you when someone takes away the supplies that you need and the materials that you need to get your job done and then tells you you are now responsible to go with those materials on your own and yet keep the same quota are gonna work harder and then when your boss comes in and says oh by the way you’re not getting a raise or a bonus until you figure this out that you’re gonna be the one that’s gonna want to go and work harder and achieve more within your organization I mean this is a crazy idea what is he thinking this isn’t gonna work at all and then you peel back and you kind of think about the world that we live in and you kind of analyze the countries that are all over our globe and you would think by now with the advancement of humanity that we would have figured it out by now and we haven’t some of you are probably thinking about countries where people innocent people are living under the oppression of a dictator who thinks that he’s God anybody have anyone that comes to mind how about our buddy over there in North Korea anybody thinking about North Korea and I’m fascinated as you study this country this Kim Jong-un who’s now in charge who literally thinks that he’s God and he forces his people to worship him and his father and his grandfather they literally control the entire country they brainwash all of their citizens he tells them what they’re going to do with their lives they are in fact enslaved and it’s mind-boggling that the other countries of the world actually haven’t gotten involved for some reason he just kind of gets left alone and to be honest with you sometimes I scratch my head and wonder why is it that that he’s allowed to do what he does when we have such a high value in regard for human life at least what we think on this planet that’s exactly what we’re facing here with Pharaoh so of course the slave drivers and the overseers they go out you imagine this they’re like the Union bosses are the ones that got to make the announcement to the rest of the people and they tell the people this is what Pharaoh says I will not give you any more straw go and get your own straw wherever you can find it but your work will not be reduced at all and because these people don’t know any better and they don’t know any different they go and they’re scattered all over Egypt to gather the stubble to use for the straw the slave drivers keep pressing them saying you better complete the work required of you for each day just as when you had the straw again it doesn’t make a lot of sense that they’re putting this kind of force on these people and if that’s not bad enough they decide that they’re going to turn it up just one more level as you imagine they’re already completely defeated they already feel worthless and now Pharaoh’s playing these mental games with them and the only thing left is to actually beat them physically and so Pharaoh’s slave drivers beat the Israelite overseers that had been appointed demanding of them why haven’t you met your quota of bricks yesterday or today or as before and you imagine how frustrating this must have been for the people of God here they were just a few moments ago praising God and worshiping God and believing Moses and Aaron and believing that finally they were going to be delivered and now instead of things getting better things have gotten worse have you ever been in a situation where you feel God made you a promise and you feel like your deliverance is just right there in front of you and then all of a sudden you take three steps back and you go God where are you wait God why is this happening God what what is going on in this situation why is there more hardship in my life I find fascinating what actually happens next I wish we had more context to this but it was the Israelite overseers that went and appealed to Pharaoh which means they had to have the courage to go and face him also that they actually had access to Pharaoh and could set up a meeting with him and that he would entertain their thoughts and so they say to Pharaoh why have you treated your servants this way your servants are given no straw yet we are told make bricks your servants are being beaten but the fault is with your own people wait a second hold on a second whose fault is it that they’re in this situation who’s the one that came up with this idea and if it’s Pharaoh then why are they saying it this way is it because they’re in front of him and they fear for their life and so kind of like Moses and Aaron they’re just gonna add an extra sentence to what God told him to say these guys are gonna try to soften the blow by saying oh maybe this wasn’t your idea even though they know it was his idea that your people are treating us unfairly and what are they doing they’re appealing to his humanity because there’s nothing within him that contains any morsel of God or the fear of God they’re just trying to appeal to him as a fellow human being and think about this they’re saying that we would rather just go back to you providing the materials and we’ll be your slaves and we’ll build your buildings because that’s a much better way to live than now making us have to go get the materials ourself and oh by the way the physical abuse that you’re now putting us under how awful of a situation to be in Pharaoh responds to their plea in their cries by saying lazy that’s what you are lazy which these words had a cut like a knife deep into their souls like Pharaoh seriously look at all that we’ve done for you look what all that we have built for you we have not rebelled against you we haven’t formed an army we haven’t joined your enemies to try to take you over and this is what you’re going to say that is why you keep saying Pharaoh says let us go and sacrifice to the Lord because you’re lazy now get to work you will not be given any straw there’s no mercy you must produce your full quota of the bricks and of course the Israelite overseers realize they’re in trouble their appeal to Pharaoh is not gonna happen it’s falling on deaf ears he doesn’t care and they realize they’re gonna have to reduce that they’re not gonna be able to reduce the number of bricks required that they’re gonna need for each and every day now as we read this as we read these texts these ancient texts it helps us try to figure out well how does this actually apply to my life like in real time what does this mean for you and for me as we live out the task and the challenges before us and before we get with that I want to start with Pharaoh’s response to God I want you to think about this because his first reaction is to is to refuse Moses and Aaron in their message I don’t trust you guys I don’t believe you guys and I don’t believe that you’ve heard from the Lord he then treats sacrifices and worship of their God as laziness do you find that fascinating the fact that they would want to go out and do this I mean why did no part of his brain say man if I actually give them some time off if I actually give them a break that maybe they’ll be refreshed and renewed even if I don’t believe in their God and then they’ll come back and maybe their bodies will be healed and they’ll work even longer or harder for me like those thoughts don’t come into a mind of a ruthless dictator and then of course this last bullet point that he increases his control through intimidation he knows that he owns them he knows that that he’s playing games with them and there’s two things at play here it’s physical abuse and there’s also verbal abuse in the insults that he is now hurled against them so now think of this in our world in our context what do you think is the world’s response to God’s truth anybody in here what is happening now in real time in 2026 when you have a church like Shepherds Gate that believes that the Bible does not contain errors that it’s an errant that it that it is the Word of God that it is what has the power to change and transform our lives and it’s what actually gives us the boundaries on everything that we need this side of heaven it tells us and dictates to us and commands us and implores us on how to live our lives people that are outside the faith what do you think they believe about that to be true and what is their response to it they dismiss it it’s fake what else you’re foolish to believe this the nine o’clock a lot of people said people are just angry they’re angry at Christians are angry at people that believe that that the Bible is God’s Word and what you think about this they actually dismiss the messengers and the message which I got some really great news for you all today you ready for this a new study just came out last month that showed once again people’s faith in pastors and preachers has declined once again in the United States that people actually believe their social media influencers over pastors of local congregations and it every single year so you can just go and research it you see it sliding down more and more and partly I can kind of understand that because it seems like every week there’s another pastor that’s falling from grace there’s another pastor that’s being outed for for sexual abuse or verbal abuse or mismanaging the funds of a local church and so I can see being an outsider where you’re like well there goes another one and there goes another one and this is why you can’t trust preachers the position that God ordained the role and the occupation that God created that that would be the mouthpiece about how God’s Word would go forward and if they don’t trust the pastor why would they ever trust the message that the pastor brings how about this one people that treat church and worship as antiquated anybody run into this you can’t seriously believe that the Bible is the Word of God you can’t seriously in our day and age with the advancements of technology with everything that we have you can’t please tell me you’re not that naive how foolish of you how silly of you to actually believe that and how about this last one that they control increasing control through misinformation anybody see this and what’s the number one way that misinformation is shared now come on say it louder and yet we all live on social media if you just followed my social media account you would think that I have the perfect life perfect wife perfect kids isn’t it amazing that just one picture one snapshot is so misleading we have friends right now because it’s you know I told you it was a holiday weekend and you’re like what holiday is it well tomorrow’s President’s Day so happy President’s Day everybody all of you that are in the banking community you’re probably loving that you get tomorrow off schools are off Utica’s off and so a lot of our friends they’re either down south in Florida on beaches or they’re up north enjoying the the ski resorts that we have here in Michigan and isn’t it awesome when you take a picture of your family on the beach and you post it on social media because part of it is you want to remind yourself Latin next year that you were on a beach this time but also it’s kind of a torture everybody else that’s back in Michigan isn’t it come on and those of us with kids when we get them together and you know the water and the Sun and we’re like boom and everyone back home goes man I am so jealous that I’m not on a beach right now meanwhile they have no idea that that’s just one second of time that if you take your kids on vacation that is not peaceful ok that people are probably fighting with each other’s spouses could be at each other’s throats I don’t care how many margaritas you suck down your problems are still there the next day we just manufacture a world that doesn’t actually exist and it’s the same thing with misinformation can I just go here for a moment I was fascinated you know with the Super Bowl last week and obviously most of us didn’t care about the two teams that were in it some of you were Seahawks stuff which was fine must be from Seattle but what played out on social media the following days people weren’t posting about one team or the other or anything that had to do with the game all the stuff on social media was all about a 13-minute segment that was between two halves called the halftime show and everyone had to pick a side because you have to pick a side now because that’s the whole idea in our society is that we need to be against each other and yet if you peel back a long enough and start thinking about it like is that really what we want to do is that really what we want to be part of is always trying to defend one side or the other and yet Jesus comes along and he says you know how people are gonna know if you’re my disciples they’re gonna know if you’re my disciples by the by your ability to love one another not to debate one another and argue with one another and of course now we know all of the misinformation that is shared and sometimes I get on these algorithms where I’ll have people deconstructing their faith or people that are Mormons that are just ripping apart the Christian faith and I mean you could spend hours and hours in the way that these things work now and what are they all fighting for they’re fighting for our attention and they’re fighting for our time and I’m just old school this morning folks I just believe the best thing that we can do is go back to the Bible the black and white text that are in our hands and to read God’s Word because it has the power to change and transform our lives and it also has the power to build and nurture our faith I know some of you think I’m crazy because I tell you to bring your Bibles to church and to leave your cell phones in your car I just think an hour and a half every week of just devoted time to the Lord is something that all of us can actually do and there’s a freedom to it it’s not a law thing you don’t have to do this some of you don’t have to listen to me in fact the last service was really funny because someone’s cell phone went off and I thought someone was having a heart attack in our worship service because it was going and and and and then I thought the church was on fire so then I was like okay heart attacks one person if the church burns down we’re all gonna die but we’re so conditioned with these things yeah what is it that God is speaking to us what is that still small voice that he says to us a few more verses here these guys leave defeated they’re frustrated and I totally understand it and they go and they find Moses and Aaron who are waiting to meet them Moses and Aaron knew that they were going to meet with Pharaoh and you only can imagine what Moses and Aaron were doing in that in-between time and as they finally get to Moses and Aaron they don’t have their arms out they’re not looking for hugs they’re not ready to circle up and do a and do a prayer rally with this guys instead they look at Moses and Aaron and they say may the Lord look on you and judge you you have made us obnoxious to Pharaoh and his officials and have put a sword in their hand to kill us do you know what this is right here this is an emotional response to a situation where they can’t work it out on their own they are livid they they are they are at the end of what they are actually capable of they’ve already gone to Pharaoh they’ve already made their case and they realize that they are not going to be able to fix the problem and to make things easier for their fellow Israelites want you to think about the crisis of faith they’re experiencing in this moment from praising God to now persecuting and blaming Moses and Aaron from having feelings of hope and finally God’s gonna intervene on our behalf to now completely back in the moment of their despair from having an expression of outward faith of worshiping God and now there’s this internal struggle of pointing the finger and blaming one another and it’s all because God hasn’t unfolded his plan and his promise yet in the time that they want him to instead God is still weaving out whatever it is that he’s going to do in and through the situation now I want us for a moment to go to the New Testament because in the New Testament we find passages of the early church struggling just as much trying to navigate life being persecuted by the outside world they were persecuted by the Jewish community they were persecuted by the Gentile community those that were agnostic and atheist I mean it was coming in from all angles and this guy named Paul under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit pens this word pens these words to a church in Corinth that was literally in a community that was turned upside down and these are the words he gave them to bring them home he said we are afflicted in every way but Shepherds Gate if you didn’t know we are afflicted in every way in the culture that we live in it’s gonna come from every single angle because the devil’s not happy and he’s gonna manifest himself through people like Pharaoh or people in our lives that aren’t followers of Jesus but even though we’re being afflicted we’re not crushed heck yes perplexing sometimes our minds just can’t wrap I can’t wrap itself around like why we’re going through these hardships but we will not be driven to despair of course we’re gonna be persecuted because Jesus said we would be persecuted but we will never be forsaken struck down but we will not be destroyed and I think this is the hardest part because he said we look not to the things that are seen but to the things that are what the spiritual realm keeping our eyes fixed on the person and work of Jesus Christ and what he has already accomplished on the cross for us for the things that we see in this world they’re temporary and yet the things that are unseen those are what actually matters that’s the eternal and so this is what we do as we prepare our hearts to receive Holy Communion this morning he tells us to hold fast the confession of our hope no matter what life throws at us no matter the hardships that we face even when things don’t go the way that we want them to go we hold on to Jesus because he is the one that has made the promises and he is faithful and here’s his promises that he’s coming back for his church and he will take us to be with him for all eternity that’s the promise that we have in our faith in Jesus Christ so as we come to the table this morning let’s keep that in view let’s remind ourselves of that and why we’re here and that whatever circumstance we find ourselves in God is always at work and he will see us through it will you bow your heads and close your eyes with me this morning if you’re new to Shepherds Gate our communion guidelines are going to be on the screen you can look at the screen it gives you a little bit more