I’ll Bring You More than a Song

I’ll Bring You more than a Song
Exodus 15:1-21                                     
May 1, 2022

There are many types of song in the world. There are love song of people professing their eternal love to each other, songs of heartache, of love that had been lost, songs about adventure and the great unknown, songs about hope and songs of despair. Then there are different genres: rock music, metal music, contemporary music, jazz, classical, rap, fusions between these different types, and country music. Now I heard something interesting about country music….

Each one of these types of music has a different emotional effect on people. It can stir love, anger, defiance, hope, and every other type of emotion known to man.

Music and songs are very important. It influences the individual, but also the masses and affects generations. The reason it is so powerful, is because it takes knowledge or an idea, and then fuses it with emotion which melody stirs up. This has an amazing effect on people. Studies have shown that knowledge or information coupled with an emotional feeling burns firmly into our memory.

Illus. Having to learn the books of the bible is difficult,…

This is why the enemy loves to use music. It transforms people without them even thinking about it or knowing it.

However, he is not the source of this principle. God designed us and had beautiful things in mind when He designed this principle.

When we look at Exodus 15, Moses and the Israelites just witnessed an amazing miracle. God had taken them out of Egypt, setting them free from tyranny and bondage. Then God annihilated the enemy at the Red Sea, setting them free of the fear of the enemies’ pursuit.

 Something amazing had happened! So, Moses and the Men of Israel broke forth in song, singing of God’s greatness, what He has done, and what He promised.

When God does something amazing, the soul must sing. That is why we worship in Church. True, heartfelt and authentic worship is very powerful. In fact, we are seeing an amazing movement of worship in this church. There is ‘something’ happening that is very exciting…

In this text, we are going to look at principles of worship, how we apply it, and how it affects our lives.

When we search through the Bible, we see that there are three primary reasons to praise God which are also seen in this piece of Scripture. It will show us how we can bring God more than a song.

I.  Praise God for Who He IS

We get a small glimpse into who God is in this song of Moses. All the words in all the languages do not have the capacity to begin to describe God’s greatness. He is the beginning and the end, the reason we exist, and as such He should be the focal point of our song. We can, however, look at some attributes that expands our limited understanding of Him.

A.  He is Highly Exalted

• Verse 1- ‘He is highly exalted.’ There is no one like our God. He is exalted above all rule, all authority, stands outside of time and is the source of life who sustains life. There is no adversary worthy of Him, no one can restrain Him, nothing can contain him. He is the I AM.

B.  He is our Strength

• Verse 2 – He is our strength… God gives strength to the weary, but not only gives strength. He is our strength. He is the power at work in us through the Holy Spirit that strengthens the inner man.

C.  He is your salvation

• Verse 2 – … my salvation. This means that He is our deliverance and rescues from sin. But not only that, He is also our deliverance from the consequences of sin. The Hebrew words used in this verse for salvation is Yeshua, which is the Hebrew word for Jesus. He literally is my salvation.

D.  He Fights for, AND with you

• Verse 3 – the Lord is a warrior. As we can see in the context of this whole chapter where it speaks of God fighting for Israel against Egypt, God is literally a warrior. He is the one who is fighting for you, and He is with you in the fight.

Deuteronomy 20:4, for the Lord your God is the one who goes with you, to fight for you against your enemies, to save you.’

• However, it doesn’t stop there. If we acknowledge that the Exodus from Egypt and the history of what followed is a picture of our spiritual growth in Christ, we see that followers of Christ grow in what their part in future battles are.
• In the beginning of your spiritual walk, God fights the battles for you, but as we grow in grace, knowledge, and faith, we have more of a responsibility in the battle. The strength from which we operate is still from God, but we have to stand in faith for the victory.

Joshua 1:9, “Have I not commanded you? Be strong and courageous! Do not tremble or be dismayed, for the Lord your God is with you wherever you go.”

Rom 8:31, What then shall we say to these things? If God is for us, who is against us?

• This grows us in maturity of character and faith.

E.  He is loving and Kind

• Verse 13 – Your loving-kindness… This is one of the attributes of God that I am the most thankful for. Can you imagine serving an all-powerful God who are not loving and kind? Who are not faithful and just? A God who is ruled by his whims? A God who rules with mood swings? A God who is cruel and self-centered?
• Because of God’s lovingkindness and his long-suffering heart towards us, His reluctance to punish people for their sins as they deserve, people tend to forget how great God is, how powerful, and how worthy of our awe.
• We can continue to study who God is for hours, but the principle is that He is worthy of all praise and our worship simply because of who He is. God doesn’t have to prove anything. Even if He does nothing for us, He is still worthy of our praise.

II.  Praise God for What He Has Done

It is important to focus on what God has done for you. Failure to do so, can make one ungrateful and feel dissatisfied. Much of the song they are singing in this chapter flows from the miracle God has performed.

• Verse 6-7, Your right hand, O Lord, is majestic in power, Your right hand, O Lord, shatters the enemy. And in the greatness of Your excellence, You overthrow those who rise up against You;

A.  Build a Monument

• Many times in the Old Testament we see that when God had done something amazing, the people would build an altar on which to bring sacrifices of thanksgiving. The equivalent of this in modern times would be monuments put up to remember events and shine as a beacon from the past into our future.
• As an example, we see God instructing Joshua to tell the Israelites while crossing the Jordan in a similar scenario to set up a monument.

 Joshua 4:4 – 7, So Joshua called the twelve men whom he had appointed from the sons of Israel, one man from each tribe; and Joshua said to them, “Cross again to the ark of the Lord your God into the middle of the Jordan, and each of you take up a stone on his shoulder, according to the number of the tribes of the sons of Israel. Let this be a sign among you, so that when your children ask later, saying, ‘What do these stones mean to you?’ then you shall say to them, ‘Because the waters of the Jordan were cut off before the ark of the covenant of the Lord; when it crossed the Jordan, the waters of the Jordan were cut off.’ So these stones shall become a memorial to the sons of Israel forever.”

• Interestingly, Israel sang a beautiful song to the Lord in our text, but did not build an altar, or monument of remembrance after the crossing of the red sea. The reason for this was that God told them to never go back to Egypt. They never had to come back to that place again. But when they crossed over into the promised land, they built a monument of remembrance.
• This is a very important principle in our lives and specifically our spiritual lives as well. We need to remember what God has done for us. Especially when we are going through difficult times, it is good to have monuments to look back on so we can have hope for the future.
• A great way to build a monument, is to keep a journal. When you pray over a problem and God answer, write it down in remembrance. When future troubles come, it is a great source of hope to go back to the monuments you have written down.

Psalm 103:2, Bless the Lord, O my soul, and forget none of His benefits…

Illus. My dad was a policeman. As such, he has many interesting stories. I remember when my kids were little, they would go and sit on his lap and ask him to tell them some of these amazing adventures.

• Stories of God’s greatness are powerful monuments. The Israelites would capture their stories in songs so it could be taught to generations to follow. It is exactly what we do with praise and worship music. We bless the Lord and forget none of His benefits.
• This is a very practical principle to apply daily through prayer, and through song. When we sing songs of what God has done, it sets us up with a hopeful outlook for the day. This is one of the reasons why I love to praise and worship God, singing to Him. Especially during the extra time I have in the morning on my way to school drop-off or work. We all have times like these we could use effectively praising God.
• You might say that you do not have any personal monuments to fall back on yet. The one and most important thing we should thank God for is what Jesus has done on the cross. Even if He does nothing else for us ever again, He would be worthy of our eternal praise and worship for this. It is the greatest monument from our past shining hope into the eternal future.
• Praise God for What He is Going to Do
• The wonderful thing is that God’s glorious work isn’t all in the past. In fact, there are many prophecies and promises in the word that are for today, tomorrow, and the future, even unto eternity.

A.  Move towards your inheritance

• Verse 17 – You will bring them and plant them in the mountain of Your inheritance.
• After Israel witnessed what God has done and who He is, it gave them a springboard of hope for the future. Now they believed what they have not yet seen; that God would take them to the place that He promised.
• When we look at our own monuments and what God has done for us, it should stir up faith in us, trusting God for that which we do not yet see.
• God wants to bring you to the mountain of your inheritance. A mountain speaks of an elevated place from which you view the situation. Inheritance are those promises we have in Christ. In other words, we look at our life and situation from an elevated position from the angle of God’s promises.
• As we grow in faith and knowledge, this will enable us to view our circumstances, however difficult, from a perspective of victory that has already been won.
• I love to teach on this revelation of the Hebrew word for praise, yadah. It has the implication that you should praise God for that which you do not yet see, trusting in the fact that God knows best for your future.

Illus. A great example of this is when Paul and Silas were prisoners…

• If we can learn to trust God in the middle of our circumstances even if we do not understand, and trust Him to know best, it will give us amazing peace and hope. We surrender to God and to His purpose so He can do exceedingly and abundantly, far above what we could think or dream.

B.  Your Enemies will run in fear

• Verse 15 – 17, It points to the effect God’s redeeming hand has in the spiritual realm. When we understand that the battle has already been won in the spirit, it will affect how we react in the flesh.

Colossians 2:15, When He had disarmed the rulers and authorities, He made a public display of them, having triumphed over them through Him.

• When Jesus said, “IT IS FINISHED!”, He totally disarmed the enemy, sin, and death. The picture is of a conquering King dragging the enemy bound in chains into the city, stripped of all authority.

Isaiah 14: 17, They will ponder over you, saying, ‘Is this the man who made the earth tremble, Who shook kingdoms, who made the world like a wilderness And overthrew its cities, Who did not allow his prisoners to go home?’

• There is power in a song of praise to God. The enemy must flee. Just as the evil spirit had to flee when David started to play, and Jehoshaphat’s enemies were defeated when the nation lifted a song, your song, and the church’s song has great power. It will change generations. Will you join in the song?
• The call to worship, though, calls to more than a song. It calls to a heart of worship. It calls to a life of worship. A life that flows from worship into a lifestyle of worship. Worship is not what we do, it is who we are.
• This will bring revival.