Episode Details

Choose Your Hard

• In your health
• In your relationships
• With your kids
• With your career

Same with Following God

• Without God = HARD
• With God = HARD
• Choose your heard

Just because all things are difficult doesn’t mean all OUTCOMES are the same value

• Some things, while difficult, are worth more than others
• We’re talking about this because of the new series…

>>LOST: A WAY IN THE WILDERNESS

Being in a wilderness season is when things are abnormally…

• Difficult
• Confusing
• Disorienting
• Uphill
• Just plane HARD

But wilderness seasons have purpose…

A WILDERNESS SEASON IS WHERE WE LEARN WHO GOD IS, HOW HE LOVES US, AND HOW WE SHOULD INTERACT WITH HIM

We are looking at the story of the EXODUS

• The escape of the Israelite people from Egypt to the PROMISED LAND

Last week was about the 10 plagues in Egypt

God’s purpose for many wilderness seasons is to teach us about Himself

Today, we continue that story…
Egypt finally has enough of God and his people

• They let Israel Go
• They send them with riches

Pharaoh has a change of heart…

Exodus 14

5 When the king of Egypt was told that the people had fled, Pharaoh and his officials changed their minds about the people and said, “What have we done? We have released Israel from serving us.”

So he gathers part of his army and pursues the people of Israel

• Israel is gathered on the banks of the Red Sea

Exodus 14

10 As Pharaoh approached, the Israelites looked up and there were the Egyptians coming after them! The Israelites were terrified and cried out to the Lord for help. 11 They said to Moses, “Is it because there are no graves in Egypt that you have taken us away to die in the wilderness? What have you done to us by bringing us out of Egypt? 12 Isn’t this what we told you in Egypt: Leave us alone so that we may serve the Egyptians? It would have been better for us to serve the Egyptians than to die in the wilderness.”

Moses responds…

13 But Moses said to the people, “Don’t be afraid. Stand firm and see the Lord’s salvation that he will accomplish for you today; for the Egyptians you see today, you will never see again. 14 The Lord will fight for you, and you must be quiet.”

Moses prays…

• Stretches out his arms
• God parts the waters
• Israel walks through unharmed
• Pharaoh follows them in
• God releases the waters and drowns the Egyptian army

Through this, Israel and the world learn that…

God always makes a way for His People

• God parted the waters
• God gave water from a rock
• God fed them in the desert
• God ALWAYS makes a way

What does this mean for us?

God is the one who makes a way in your circumstances

• In your pain
• In your struggle

First, God introduced Himself to the people

Next, God was teaching the people to TRUST HIM

• That is what wilderness seasons do
• They point you back to God and teach you to trust

There are two important things to know about GOD MAKING A WAY

That is what following God can be like

• You won’t always understand why

Israel didn’t know why God had brought them to the sea

“Have you brought us here to die!”

But God had a bigger purpose in bringing them there

• We’re still talking about it today

When you don’t kno