2ndSunday of Advent
December 3, 2017
The ANGEL of the LORD Comes With PROTECTION
Exodus 14:19-20
Dear brothers and sisters in Christ:
Think of the vast universe that God has created. Our planet is just a little blue marble in the solar system, and the solar system is a speck on a wing of the Milky Way. Where are you in this picture? How could God possibly take care of you and me? Why would he want to? Have you ever felt like that, when you’ve been in trouble or just feel lost and can’t find your way? You may think: “The Lord is the Almighty, the great and powerful and holy God, and he is ruling over all the world, and I’m not so important or special, and he certainly has better things to do than to bother with me.
How important to know that we have a God who not only rules the universe, but his almighty power includes the ability to see and hear and take care of each individual soul that he has created. That’s what makes him God – he is taking care of the vast universe, yet has the ability to take care of even the sparrows!
What an amazing God we have that he was willing to become one of the little ones, a no-name baby born in a barn in a backwater town called Bethlehem. There were the angels and shepherds and later a handful of magi, but hardly anyone noticed that God himself had come into this world.
God himself came into this world in Old Testament times too! Centuries before Jesus was born on earth, He came to visit in times of trouble. When it seemed to the people that God was far away, it was the Son of God as the Angel of the Lord that came to them and helped them out of their difficulties. Last week, we discovered that the second person of the Trinity is the main spokesman for the Triune God, He’s the Word. And he’s the one who also came visibly to people at very special times of need. He was often called THE Angel of the LORD. We saw him come to Abraham last week, with his precious promises. This week, we see him visit the children of Israel on their way out of Egypt. And we see that The ANGEL of the LORD Comes With PROTECTION
Let’s take a trip 3,500 years ago, out on the edge of Egypt, next to the Sea of Reeds. The children of Israel are there and they are in trouble. On one side is this huge body of water and on the other side, Pharaoh with his chariots and soldiers in hot pursuit. The ruler of Egypt had let God’s people go, after the last plague when all the firstborn sons died. But now he’s having regrets. All their free labor disappeared when Israel left and the Egyptians have no one to do all the backbreaking work and the menial jobs they don’t want to do themselves. So Pharaoh decided to round them up and bring them back to slavery. And they’re going to pay for all these plagues and all this trouble. But the Lord had other ideas about who was going to pay. Then the angel of God, who had been traveling in front of Israel's army, withdrew and went behind them. The pillar of cloud also moved from in front and stood behind them, coming between the armies of Egypt and Israel. Throughout the night the cloud brought darkness to the one side and light to the other side; so neither went near the other all night long.
Right in the midst of all this trouble, was the angel of the Lord. Remember that this is no ordinary angel, but God himself, the second person of the Trinity. It was the Word, the Son of God who had called Moses from the bush that did not burn up. Now the same Lord has been guiding the whole group of Israelites out of Egypt with a much larger column of fire. By day the Lord went ahead of them in a pillar of cloud to guide them on their way and by night in a pillar of fire to give them light, so that they could travel by day or night. Ex. 13:21. There were not two different pillars or columns, but during the sunshine of the day, they could see a column of heavy cloud, while during the night that same column glowed with the glory of God’s presence. Yes, it was the Lord himself, sometimes called the angel of the Lord, who was with them. He was guiding them. They had nothing to fear.
Remember that when you get fearful of the journey. Even though we don’t have such a visible sign of the Lord’s presence, he is there. Ever since the Lord came to us in our Baptisms, he has been there. Every step of the way, whether you could see him or feel him or not he has been there. Especially in times of trouble when it seems you have hit a dead end and there’s nowhere else to go, he is there. Sometimes, we’d like to have some visible sign of his presence, but remember he’s the messenger. The angel of the Lord means the messenger of the Lord, and he has assured us: Never will I leave you, never will I forsake you. So we can depend on God’s guidance in our life, even when it seems impossible.
That’s what Israel found out when it seemed like they were caught between a rock and a hard place: nothing but water in front, and the enemy army behind. When it seemed like there was no place to go, the Lord found a way.
21 Then Moses stretched out his hand over the sea, and all that night the LORD drove the sea back with a strong east wind and turned it into dry land. The waters were divided, [22] and the Israelites went through the sea on dry ground, with a wall of water on their right and on their left.Imagine over a million people, with all their livestock, walking through the bottom of the sea, all in one night. The space of dry land must have 3 or 4 football fields wide! The Lord provided a way when there was none.
And what about the angel of the Lord? Through his massive column of cloud, he threw the attackers into confusion. They were so lost in the fog that the Egyptians didn’t come near the Israelites all night. On the other side, he provided them light, so they could see what they were doing and where they were going, right in the middle of the night. And so that angel of the Lord came to earth and said, I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will never walk in darkness, but will have the light of life. John 8:12.
We have the light of life, we know Jesus as the one who brought us from the darkness of sin and death, to the light of God’s love. We know that we will see the light and glory of heaven some day. So is there any reason why we can’t trust and rely on his guidance through life to get us there? The angel of the Lord will light our way, and provide the dry ground to march through the midst of the flood.
During WW2, the King of England ordered the evacuation of all children from the bombed areas of London. Many of the youngsters had never been away from home, and now they were supposed to leave on a train, without their parents. A mother and father had put their young son and smaller daughter aboard such a train and said goodbye. The little girl began to cry and told her brother she was scared because she didn’t know where they were going. Big brother brushed his own tears away, and put his arm around his little sister. He said, “I don’t know where we are going either, but the King knows, and that’s all that matters.’
My dear friends, like those little children, we may not know exactly where we are going either, but our King knows and that’s all that matters! We can rely on his guidance in our lives. No matter what the roadblock, no matter what enemy is in hot pursuit, he provides the way out, even if it takes a major miracle! And he will deliver us!
God had provided a way for his people to go forward, but there was still a major problem from behind – the Egyptian chariots were in hot pursuit. 23 The Egyptians pursued them, and all Pharaoh's horses and chariots and horsemen followed them into the sea. [24] During the last watch of the night the LORD looked down from the pillar of fire and cloud at the Egyptian army and threw it into confusion. [25] He made the wheels of their chariots come off so that they had difficulty driving. And the Egyptians said, "Let's get away from the Israelites! The LORD is fighting for them against Egypt." And you know what happened next. The waters returned to their place and as Moses wrote in his song for the day, the first song in the Bible: “Pharaoh’s army and his chariots God cast into the sea.” The Lord had delivered his people. The angel of the Lord had come with his protection.
And so dear friends, we have the Angel of the Lord who has freed us from the slavery of sin and death. He’s put us on the journey to the promised land of heaven. But it seems like there’s an enemy army in hot pursuit, trying to drag us back into captivity. Perhaps there sins of the past that come back to haunt you and attack you once again. But who is there to block the way? The angel of the Lord came down and put himself in the middle, and took all the punishment we deserved, so that we could go ahead, free of guilt. He put himself in the middle between our sinful selves and a holy God when he took all of our punishment on the cross. On the other side of the cross, we rose in glory and victory and we have his shining light guiding us ahead.
It’s no longer the Pharaoh and his army, but the devil with his army of demons is in hot pursuit, trying to reclaim us and bring us back to the slavery of the world of darkness and despair. Even in the midst of our Christmas celebrations he would like to mess it all up. That happens whenever we let our Christmas depend on good family times and gifts. If Christmas is only about family, the devil can wreck your entire Christmas by messing up your plans, by sickness, bad weather, arguments. If Christmas is only about the gifts that you receive, what happens when you can’t afford them? The devil would like our children to concentrate on being good for the god-like being in the red suit and white beard. I hope the original Christian St. Nickolas, who set the example by giving and helping doesn’t know what kind of an idol or false god he has been turned into. Concentrate only on the gifts, and you miss out on the greatest gift of all. That’s when then powerful, glorious angel of the Lord gave it all up to become born as a humble human being with the gift of life for all of us! Don’t let the devil and his false promises drag you back into misery!
There is a verse in Psalm34 which says: The Angel of the Lord encamps around those who fear him, and he delivers them. 34:7 That promise is for us as much as for Israel that day by the Sea. For us too, “Pharaoh’s army and his chariots God cast into the sea.” The devil and all his temptations have been wiped out in the flood waters that poured from the cross. His doom was sealed when Jesus rose! Let us sing , let us sing, to the God who sets us free! Amen.