By Rev. Dr. Rick Chesher
For those of you that have never been to Cornerstone Baptist Church I am a pastor that loves to preach through books of the Bible. I love the richness we get when we keep within the context of the Scripture themselves. I also like to talk about where some of the things discussed in the New Testament were first mentioned in the Old Testament and what it meant there.
I have, for the last year and a half, been preaching through the Book of Hebrews in the New Testament. It is here, and more specifically, I have had the pleasure of teaching about Faith, you the Hall of Faith. And what a great study it has been. It is here I want to share about today.
We have all heard about Moses and Israel coming out of Egypt and crossing the Red Sea. But in the midst of this story Yahweh given me some insight I would like to pass on. When Pharaoh finally told Moses to take Israel and leave and they did so, it says Pharaoh had a change of heart and went after them.
Pharaoh put together his best chariots and Army and chases them. Israel had come to the Red Sea and turned around and saw Pharaoh and his army coming down on top of them. Scripture says they were terrified. This is all in Exodus 14:5-14, and this word terrified or in the King James Version it says sore afraid in the Hebrew means to morally revere. So Israel was morally reverencing Pharaoh, even though it says they were calling out to God for help, they were still morally reverencing Pharaoh.
Now this is important, Moses tells Israel to stop morally reverencing (being Terrified) Pharaoh and to stand still and watch the salvation. Now to stand still in the Hebrew can mean to offer or present yourself, and in this case to your salvation. Salvation in the Hebrew is Yashua, so they were to stop presenting themselves to Pharaoh and to offer themselves to Yashua their salvation.
Now this is really important because Paul brings this same thing up in Romans 12:1-2. Paul tells us to present our bodies as living sacrifices to Yahweh and to not be conformed to this world. When we are afraid of something we are present ourselves to whatever it is as a sacrifice to that thing, person, or whatever it is and not to Yahweh as we are supposed to do, and that thing becomes our god. It goes back to the second Command in the Ten Commands, “Do not have other gods besides Me”, what we present ourselves to is the other gods. So remember, next time you are tempted to be afraid, stop and remember to present yourself to your salvation Yashua. It is only as we learn and practice being a living sacrifice to Yahweh will we also experience the victory in our lives. Remember, Israel walked across the Red Sea on dry land and Pharaoh and his army were drowned.