Well, I invite you to turn to the second book of the Bible tonight, the book of Exodus, as we're making our way through this book. And tonight we come to what is essentially the requirements of the conquest of Canaan. Thinking about this, you'll remember that I had even named, way back in Genesis, I doubt anyone remembers this but that i had named one of my sermons the conquest of paradise and adam had failed in that adam had broke the mission that the lord gave him and to exercise dominion and here we're seeing certain requirements that are again being set before israel and we should all ask the question how did the conquest of paradise go for them It seems to me you have all the themes again really reinforced here that we've already studied and looked at in the Garden of Eden playing out. And tonight we'll see some of that, but ultimately leading us to the answer to Israel's great failure. So tonight we come to Exodus chapter 23, beginning at verse 20 to the end of the chapter. Behold, I send an angel before you to guard you on the way and to bring you to the place I have prepared. Pay careful attention to him and obey his voice. Do not rebel against him, for he will not pardon your transgression, for my name is in him. But if you carefully obey his voice and do all that I say, then I will be an enemy to your enemies and an adversary to your adversaries. When my angel goes before you and brings you to the Amorites and the Hittites and the Perizzites and the Canaanites, the Hivites, the Jebusites, and I blot them out, you shall not bow down to their gods nor serve them, nor do as they do, but you shall utterly overthrow them and break their pillars in pieces. You shall serve the Lord your God, and he will bless your bread and your water, and I will take sickness away from among you. None shall miscarry or be barren in your land. I will fulfill the number of your days. I will send my terror before you and will throw into confusion all the people against whom you shall come. And I will make all your enemies turn their backs to you. And I will send hornets before you, which shall drive out the Hivites and the Canaanites and the Hittites from before you. I will not drive them out before you in one year, lest the land become desolate and the wild beasts multiply against you. Little by little, I will drive them out from before you until you have increased and possessed the land. And I will set your border from the Red Sea to the Sea of the Philistines and from the wilderness of the Euphrates. For I will give the inhabitants of the land into your hand and you shall drive them out before you. You shall make no covenant with them and their gods. They shall not dwell in your land, lest they make you sin against me. For if you serve their gods, there will surely be a snare to you. May the Lord bless the hearing of his word. Well, we have spent some time now studying these civil laws that the Lord put in place to be a great blessing for the nation of Israel and the theocracy as they lived. And I really wanted to capture as we went through those laws and spent some serious time on those laws. It wasn't easy stuff to go through. But I think looking at that, we really did get a great sense of the goodness of God. Think about all the things that we learned about how good God is. Caring for the poor, wanting to see them clothed at night and not going to bed cold. You had all sorts of things that were shown to us. The Lord concerned about pregnant women and about women caring with child and the child in the womb. All this stuff that we've looked at, we see a righteous and a holy and a good and a pure God. His law, of course, being that reflection and statements of demonstrating his righteous character it puts on display his his wisdom and his perfect will this is good the law is good we should be able to say that all the time the law is good oh how i love your law oh god i mean how could anyone not read this section of scripture and come up with that kind of conclusion the law is good the commandment is holy as paul said but i think it would be wrong as we're going through this to miss how the New Testament presents to us the big picture when looking at this story of the nation of Israel. And especially this particular phenomenon of the giving of the law on Mount Sinai, which really does encompass here we're seeing a sort of law covenant between chapters 19 and 24. And it's interesting how the writers of scripture describe what's happening and where we are right now in the particular exodus and the giving of these laws how many of the new testament writers are describing this and explaining this for us this is major portions of our bible so we have to give ourselves to understand this and i believe there's great blessing and understanding this so that you see the whole story of the bible this was one of the things that helped me so much was to finally the bible sort of shrunk for me when i was able to see that it's one great story from genesis to revelation that's why it's important to go through these books but something that the apostle said in second corinthians chapter 3 when he said that the ministry of the law what we're dealing with here was a ministry of death that is a serious thing to say what did he mean by that and he says if this ministry of condemnation had glory, he goes on to say, the ministry of righteousness excels and exceeds in much more glory. That statement really does help, I believe, understanding Exodus 23. If the ministry of condemnation had glory, the ministry of righteousness exceeds in much more glory. What is the ministry of condemnation? how do we understand that what was he talking about well it was this administration in the giving of the law and what we have been studying in this distinct distinct section of exodus 19 through 24 that a certain covenant is being emphasized and commitments are being made and promises are being given and there's there's going to be a ratification ceremony coming up in chapter 24 and there would be commitment sworn and Israel would make these promises to do certain things and obey that covenant and if not as you read in this particular section certain things are not going to go well for them there would be blessings of obedience if there was obedience and there would be curses for disobedience it's right here we just read it tonight well that's really important as we look at this tonight that what happened to israel and the big testimony of the bible is they broke this covenant that's jeremiah 31 not the new covenant i'm talking about he talked about the covenant with the fathers which they and i quote broke they broke it what did they break that's a really important thing to think about we have to think about these things and so while the law is good this is there's nobody disputing that while the commandment is holy while i love god's law while it shows forth his righteous character while we have put on display the goodness of god all throughout the old testament no one disputes that that is he is good and he's righteous as our as our confession and catechism said tonight the problem is we're not that's the problem and we give little place to the law of god in our life that's the truth and in that regard the law had the great function of teaching people about their sin big picture and to face the consequences of breaking the law and that they would turn away the ultimate goal even throughout the old testament turn away from themselves and look to god's answer i'm going to show you that that's tonight in this particular text this is why the bible has always presented to us two kinds of righteousness there is god's righteousness romans 1 but now the right Romans 3, now the righteousness of God is revealed. You have Romans 1 and 3 saying that. And then there's human righteousness. The way that we live before God. Think of the question in the Heidelberg tonight. Can we pay this debt ourselves? If anyone began to say yes, you're talking about human righteousness. Human righteousness. Two kinds of righteousness the Bible has presented to us. And this was the basis upon which Paul in Romans 9 would say, Israel really struggled because trying to establish their own righteousness, according to the law, they would not submit to the righteousness that comes from God. Romans 9. Now, I lay that background a bit because I believe you're starting to see this here in Exodus 23 work its way out to teach us this. Namely, the difference between the Old and the New Covenant. And it is a difference we have to think about. The Christian gospel has always been that we should turn away from ourselves and look to Jesus. That's always been the message. And that is not a new message in the New Testament. This is a message that has permeated and always dominated the Old Testament. And I'll, Lord willing, show you that here shortly. Was Israel taught the gospel? Absolutely, Israel was taught the gospel. And I believe we will see this together tonight. What they were put under here and what, as Paul makes that distinguish, distinguishes between under law here, has a specific purpose of teaching all of us about the problem of sin and the wrong kind of righteousness to pursue. So with that in mind tonight, let's look at this. I want to begin with, you'll notice God's announcement here in chapter 24, 23, that he is going to send his angel among them. Verse 20, Behold, I send an angel before you to guard you on the way and to bring you to the place that I have prepared. What an exciting statement, isn't it? I'm going to send an angel in front of you. He's going to bring you into the land. This is going to be great. It's interesting as we go on, and then we start to think a little bit about who the angel is because there's been a lot of speculation among commentators and writers and thinkers about who the angel really is. And some will go on and say, I've heard all sorts of suggestions from Moses to Joshua, just an angel, another angel from heaven. It's interesting what's attributed to this angel. He keeps them. They are to obey his voice. That was the one thing angels never said to do to them. They're obeying God's voice, right? Don't bow down to me. You'll notice here that the angel has the ability to forgive sins. Notice that in verse 21. And he says there, Be careful, pay attention to him and obey his voice. Do not rebel against him for he will not pardon your transgressions. It seems to me very clear as we're looking at this, and this has been generally received, that you have already met this angel back in chapter 3 when he met Moses in the burning bush. And the burning bush, it was, as that construction we looked at so long ago from Exodus chapter 3, the angel that is Yahweh. He appeared to Moses and said, I am promising to go with you. That was Moses' great concern. I will go with you. i'm going to bring you there and so i don't think we were wrong to say that we have here as has been uh concluded by many the pre-incarnate christ who had come among them in a pillar of fire and protected them through the sea that christ was already promising and teaching them of his work of deliverance that meant that means that when they were pulled out of egypt when they were brought out of bondage the whole truth of the christian gospel that we celebrate today was unfolding before their eyes and we've looked at this we've studied this we've we've been studying this now for some time the lord had freed them from bondage and slavery in egypt they he had put on display his power over that wicked tyrant that antichrist figure they sat there and watched the lord rain down all kinds of powerful plagues upon them delivering them from the hands of the egyptians with signs and wonders he shook the most powerful nation on the face of the earth blew them over like it was nothing drowned pharaoh and his captains right in the heart of the red sea passed them right through the red sea on dry land they sang a victory song this is the story of the life death and resurrection of christ passing through death coming out on the other side we've looked at all this and then entering in the wilderness life of sanctification moses could say as they were at the red sea stand still and look at the salvation of the lord study it watch this this is the gospel this is the story this is the single story of the bible he opened the red sea and he presented two massive remember columns that came down and shielded them and protect them bringing them through washed and baptized as paul would say in 1 Corinthians 10 as God's people. Well, then we come to chapter 19 after a whole series of grumbling and complaining of events. And the Lord comes down on Sinai and makes this covenant with them. And so now as we come to verse 21, think about this verse. Beware of him. Obey his voice. Do not provoke him. For he will not pardon your transgression. What? How easy is it to pass over that? Maybe because I want to. What a statement, huh? Obey him. Listen to that voice. For if you don't, no forgiveness. Wow. And if you do that, then I will be an enemy to your enemies and an adversary to your adversaries. For my angel will go before you and bring you to the Amorites and bring you into the Amorites and the Hittites and the Perizzites and the Canaanites and the Hivites and the Jebusites. I will cut them off. So the Lord enters into this covenant he's doing here with Israel. Blood is about to be sprinkled on the people, blood. And he would fight for them. He would go before them as is the sovereign Lord. But they were to remain absolutely loyal to him. So you'll notice, I'll drive them out. But you on your part, here are the covenant obligations. Here are the stipulations for you. You must be obedient. i will be faithful to my promises but here's your obligations and if not curses fall on you so what were they to do well verse 24 tells us they were to avoid all idolatry no idolatry in their life they were not to bow down to any of the canaanite gods now get the command all along the angel would leave them and drive out the nations Remember what the Lord said, if you obey and keep my covenant in chapter 19, you will be a special treasure to me and all the earth. And they said, all that the Lord has spoken will do. Here is this angel, and is this presence, what kind of presence is it? It seems to me that the presence was a terrifying presence. Because it comes with the announcement, if you don't obey him, beware of him. Beware of him. So they had to honor the law of God. They had to not worship any other gods, fleeing all idolatry. And of course, we're reading this knowing the whole story. We're not even going to get off the mountain and they got a massive idol they're holding up and worshiping. You shall surely overthrow them, verse 24, all the nations, and completely break down their sacred pillars. So you shall serve, worship the Lord. And if you do that, here's what God's going to do for you. He'll bless your bread and your water. the sickness is all going to be removed from you whoa imagine no more prayer requests from the pulpit this would be awesome wouldn't it no one's going to suffer a miscarriage or barren in the land all fulfill the number of your days notice this no one all notice this language here this is remarkable you ready to step up to that deal keeps going Confusion would fall on your enemies. The Lord says, I'll send hornets on them. Man, I'd love to see that. Hornets. Little by little, I'll drive them out from before you until you have increased and inherited the land. Bounds will be set up from the Red Sea, from the Sea of Philistia, from the desert to the river. Now listen carefully. For I will deliver the inhabitants of the land into your hand, and you shall drive them out from before you. You've got to go get them. I want them purged. It's your responsibility to cleanse the land. Conquer paradise. Israel may and will make a formal pledge before God to do this, by the way. And if they did that, all the blessings they would receive. And if they didn't do that, all the curses would fall. Just listen to this for a minute. You shall not worship their gods. You shall not worship them, serve them, nor do according to their deeds. You shall utterly overthrow them, break their sacred pillars and pieces, but you shall worship and serve the Lord your God only. They were required to completely and utterly cleanse the land. Now, I don't like having everyone turn everywhere in the course of the sermon, but every now and then there's a really important time to do that. And this is one of those really important times and it makes sure nobody's sleeping, right? So everyone should turn to Judges chapter two. And it's not because I saw anyone sleeping that I said that. Judges chapter two. Look at verse, chapter two ends, chapter one ends with a whole list of nations that Israel did not drive out. But then I want you to listen to this. Now, when they got to the border of the land, this angel, the Lord, showed up. Joshua, remember, saw him. It came to pass when Joshua, this is a different passage, was by Jericho that he lifted his eyes and looked, and behold, a man stood opposite. him and with his sword drawn in his hand and joshua went with him and said to him are you for us or for our adversaries so he said no but as a commander of the army of the lord i have now come see what promise is now being fulfilled of what was promised i send him before you here he is and joshua fell on his face to the earth and worshiped and said what does my lord say to his servant then the commander of the lord's army said to joshua take your sandal off your foot sounds familiar because it's exodus 3 with moses for the place where you stand is holy joshua did so he was going before them and dread fell on all the people rahab all hearts melted she said when we saw you coming remember that joshua ends the book and says this so the lord gave to israel all the land which he had sworn to give to their fathers they took possession of it and they dwelled in it the lord gave them rest all around according to all that he had sworn to their fathers not a man of all their enemies stood against them for the lord delivered all their enemies into their hand not a word failed of any good thing which the lord had spoken to the house of israel all came to pass he didn't break one bit of his word back to judges then the angel of the lord came from gilgal to bochim and said i led you from egypt and brought you to the land of which i swore to your fathers and i said i will never break my covenant with you and you shall make no covenant with the inhabitants of this land you shall tear down their altars ready but you have not obeyed my voice why have you done this therefore i also said i will not drive them out before you but they shall be thorns in your side and their god shall be a snare to you so it was when the angel of the lord spoke these words to all the children of israel that the people lifted up their voices and wept then they called the name of that place bochim and they sacrificed there to the lord then verse 11 here's the shock then the children of israel did evil in the sight of the lord and served the bales and they forsook the Lord God of their fathers who had brought them out of the land of Egypt. They followed other gods from among the gods of the people who were all around them and they bowed down to them and they provoked the Lord to anger. They forsook, verse 13, the Lord and served the Baals and the Astres. Old covenant. Did they fulfill their part? Nope. Now do you understand why Paul calls it a ministry of death are you are you seeing the bigger picture here cursed is the man who does not continue to do all things written in the book of the law to do them he puts that right in galatians 3 was the principle they were uprooted from the land weren't they don't you have a whole story of the sad tragic nation of israel in the northern kingdom and the southern kingdom being uprooted look at the history look at the history of the nation of israel to this day paul tells us it's meant to teach you something about human righteousness it's meant to that's the purpose so that the mouth of the whole world would be stopped when we study the nation of israel and so god had put israel under the law to stop the mouth and the lord here in the midst of this was teaching about his faithfulness to preserve the remnant and keep a people to himself and save a remnant in the land and you say why well god's standard doesn't change the tragic thing today is that, you know, we teach all the time, I hear this and this has been a sort of lingering statement I've heard in Reformed churches, that the basis for remaining in God's covenant, and this is where you get a little bit confused because you're not sure ultimately what you're talking about at that point. The covenant, the covenant, the covenant is upon us fulfilling our side of the covenant. And so then we really struggle. And this is why I think we get a lot of people on our deathbeds who are unsure whether they've done enough to get into glory. Think about this problem. Well, we can preach the gospel all our lives and we've told people and then you get to their deathbed and they're worried about their works. Have we not been clear on this? We say, well, as in a covenant, there are two sides and you need to keep yours through obedience. Well, we need to be very careful in how we explain this and how the New Testament describes the obedience and the fulfilling of all righteousness. The New Testament writers are constantly telling us how much more glorious the new covenant is. It's a ministry of righteousness. It's, in other words, ministering to you righteousness. Now, that angel becomes incarnate. This is the message. that angel there becomes incarnate why did he need to become incarnate that's that's the heidelberg catechism tonight why why can't we just have anyone do this because nobody can keep their side of the covenant that's the problem so he becomes incarnate and now you understand what hebrews is telling us you don't want to go back because it's presenting to you a complete savior and why do you need a savior well this is what hebrews tells us he was obedient all the way to the point of death whoa so when you get to say what did jesus do for you don't just say he died for me he was obedient for me that's awesome christ became israel for you think about it behold i send my angel to keep you in the place and to bring you into the land i prepared well god not only sent his beloved son to us but the difference is that he took it upon himself in the new covenant think about this is why he says this is the new covenant in my blood which was promised to abraham he took it upon himself to be placed under the law now the angel is under the law and to fulfill all its obligations for you in other words he made the promises and now He becomes the one to fulfill them because of our failure. Because you can't do it. How's that not the most exciting message to hear? It goes back to this morning of the disciples where they want to talk about their greatness, don't they? They want to talk about, after Jesus had just talked about His cross, they want to go and talk about their greatness. They are so wired for works. They are so wired to get out there and be great themselves. it is so hard for us he lived the life and he lived the life of israel for you immediately cast out into the wilderness overcame every temptation of the devil every temptation that israel had faced if you trace those three temptations in the wilderness that are put in the gospels they're the same temptations you can pull right out of exodus that israel faced he overcame them he beat satan for you and then he goes to the land and he conquers it what have you seen him doing in mark conquering the land casting out demons ruling over that realm and cleansing the land casting out demons defeating the devil on the cross i mean the cross was the great event where the new testament will say he disarmed him rising the third day he paid for all of our failures and entered into the heavenly land to sanctify us through the offering up says hebrews of his body that's why we call it a covenant of grace that's why we call it a covenant of grace so that the message that was preached to abraham and was preached to israel this is so important this message was preached to israel that righteousness only comes by faith in the lord jesus christ and because he he came to do this the shadow of his work is true that god sent his son to keep us and to bring us into the place that he prepared because he came under the law to fulfill it and then think about the glory of john 14 he's on the earth and he's saying i'm going away but guess what i'm coming back to get you and take you to the land so today it's it's not if then kind of arrangement is it it's not if you obey His voice, you'll not, if you don't obey His voice, you will not be forgiven. It's if you hear His voice, believe in Him. It's faith. And if you say, well, don't we have any responsibilities in this? Yes, faith, believe, and even that's a gift of God, not of work, so that no man may boast. Faith. Turn and believe. And this new covenant is so glorious because guess what? I'll remember your sins no more. I'll remember your sins no more. He mediates these blessings to us, not contingent upon our keeping of the law, but because he crawled down himself and became one of us when we couldn't. That's the difference between the old and the new. And even then, it's not that the old, they didn't know this message. They heard it. The ministry of the Spirit, though, today is to minister to you righteousness and to learn from the nation of Israel that we don't do what they did. And this is just down to its practical level, beloved, when you go to talk to someone and you talk to them about Jesus and believing. And when they rehearse for you all the good they've done and think they're going to enter into glory. This big story of the Bible is tonight. Don't do that. Israel tried it. Let me show you what Israel did and where they ended up. That's the big story. That's the big message that we shouldn't miss. And now as we go through the wilderness, we strive, we fight, we fight against all these evil principalities and powers. But you notice in the New Covenant that He's always telling us to put on Christ's armor, to go in the strength of the Lord, the power of his might. The victory belongs to him. The beauty of the new covenant is by the means of the Spirit working and in great strength, that victory, that victory, he gives us through the person and the work of Jesus. Think about this statement. For though we walk in the flesh, we do not war according to the flesh. For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but mighty in God for pulling down strongholds. casting down arguments and every high thing that exalts itself against the knowledge of god bringing every thought into captivity to the obedience of christ we press forward looking unto jesus don't we who is says hebrews the author and the perfecter of our faith the finisher of our faith who has already gone before us completed the work sat down at the right hand of God on the majesty on high and his promise to come again and take us to be with him that gives you every motivation now to go and do good that gives you every motivation now to go and be who you are in Christ that gives you every motivation to do all kinds of good works in the course of your life and to fight because the victory is yours and it's been won in him and so I encourage all of you this week to think upon these things. Think upon the cross as we were challenged this morning. The life, death and resurrection of Jesus as you go out into your week. And whatever you face remember he fought and won and now you go striving knowing that your power and strength is in him. He is your head. Let's pray to him together tonight. Gracious Heavenly Father we are thankful for the grace that you give to us and teach us the big story that these blessings received by faith alone in Christ. We have everything that we need to stand before you. And this is the message of Scripture. Keep us from trying to establish our own righteousness and help us to understand the whole story of the Scriptures. That we, Lord, would give glory to you in our life and that we would understand and believe in the cross of Christ for us and the resurrection and now as we carry ours to know that we belong in body, in soul, in life and in death to our faithful Savior the Lord Jesus Christ who became obedient for us all the way to death and paid the price. Thank You, Lord. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen.