Excusing Egypt | Sermon ReRun | Mike Braddock

Hey, if it is your first time here, we've not had the privilege of meeting. My name is Mike. I have the honor of being the executive director of ministry here at Transformation Church. And man, I'll tell you what, it is an honor and a privilege to be here with you today. And I'm excited to continue to experience the transforming power of Jesus through his word. I think God's word forms us and it shapes us. And man, it's just an honor anytime we get to share out of God's word and do it together. But I got a question. I typically start a lot of my messages off with a big question. My big question for you today is this. Do you know somebody who is stuck in the past? Ooh, you know that person who's stuck in the past? Like they get so zoned in on the past that they're like, they don't even know what's going on today. They're like, I have an uncle who's this way. He used to be like a semi-pro baseball player. And I talked to him the other day. We had a family thing and I was talking to him and he's like, man, I tell you what, you give me a good wooden bat and I could drive the ball over the center field wall tomorrow. I'm like, Uncle David, you could barely get out

of the bed, buddy. Like, I don't see you driving the ball over the wall, man. Like you're 58 years old. I don't, I just don't see it, you know? He's like, man, if I'd have hit that one more home run instead of striking out, we would have won the championship, you know? And I'm thinking about that and it's gonna be extremely important that we hold onto that idea today. But one of my favorite movies has this person in it. That kind of person who's stuck in the past. Let's watch a quick clip together. Back in 82, I used to be able to throw a pigskin a quarter mile. Are you serious? I'm dead serious. Watch this. How much you wanna make a bet I can throw a football over the mountains? Yeah, if coach would have put me in fourth quarter, we'd have been state champions. No doubt. No doubt in my mind. You better believe things have been different. I'd have gone pro. In a heartbeat, I'd be making millions of dollars and living in a big old mansion somewhere. You know, soaking it up in a hot tub with my soulmate. Anybody know any Uncle Ricos in your life?

They might still be stuck on that last play in high school or stuck on whatever. Sometimes we can get that way, right? We can be thinking about the good old days and we get real nostalgic and we begin to zone in on the past. And what it does from time to time is it puts us in a spot where we get so locked in on our past that we're absent in our present and we don't have vision for our future. Like, I think this is applicable in so many different ways. I think what we can struggle with at times is that we're like, man, it'll never be as good as it was at this time. You think about, a lot of times people allude to, hey, I remember my honeymoon phase with my spouse. Man, that honeymoon phase was amazing, but here we are 20 years married and we're just, you know, living. We got these crazy kids and whatever. And we get so wrapped up in how good it was that we forget how it is and what it could be. And today I wanna encourage you, if you've ever felt that way, I know I have, just being honest, you're not alone. This actually is a problem that happened thousands and thousands and thousands of years ago with a group of people that we know as the Israelites. The Israelites dealt with this issue of never leaving their past,

never being present in their present and never seeing the promise of their future. And today I want you to hop into the Old Testament with me, hop into the book of Numbers, Numbers 13. Just go to Genesis, make a right turn, keep going a little bit, you'll find Numbers. And what we see here is that we see this is a story that comes on the hinges of Moses, one of the most popular stories in the Bible. Moses goes into Egypt, he sets foot into Egypt. God gives him a mandate to go and free the Egyptians from the captivity of Pharaoh's reign. And he goes into Egypt, and we learned it in elementary school and in Bible school and Sunday school and kids' church. He said the words, let my people go. And magically, Pharaoh just, he fell for it because of God's power and grace and the authority that Moses had. He fell for it and he let these Israelites out of Egypt and he let them walk free and across through a dried up Red Sea into the wilderness of Paran. And after a short time, just a couple weeks later, the Israelites began to get a little unsettled. And so as you're turning to Numbers 13, I wanna give us a preview text that we find in Numbers 11 to set up the story. It says this, verse four, the Israelites started wailing and they said,

if only we had meat to eat. We remember the fish we ate in Egypt at no cost. Also, the cucumbers, the melons, the leeks, the onions, the garlic, but now we've lost our appetite. We never see anything but this manna. There's some really thankful people, aren't there? Grateful people. After this, we see Moses receives instruction from the Lord to send spies into Canaan, which would be known as the promised land, and to bring back a report to him. And he got reports all right. He got mixed reports from two groups of people, which is where we pick up today. Numbers 13, verse 25, it says, after exploring the land for 40 days, the men returned to Moses, Aaron, and the whole community of Israel at Kadesh in the wilderness of Paran. They reported to the whole community that they had seen and showed them the fruit that they had taken from the land. The Israelites legitimately, these 12 spies, went to the produce market and the promised land and brought back fruit to show the community of what they had. This was their report to Moses. We entered the land you sent us to to explore, and it is indeed a bountiful country, a land flowing of milk and honey.

Here is the kind of fruit in which it produces. Verse 28, but, come on, say but. But the people living there are powerful, and their towns are large and fortified. We can even see giants there, the descendants of Anak. The Amalekites live in the Negev, and the Hittites and Jebusites and Amorites all live in the hill country. The Canaanites live along the coast of the Mediterranean Sea along the Jordan Valley. Verse 30, but, hey, you're catching on. Caleb tried to quiet the people as they stood before Moses, and he said, let's go at once and take the land, he said. I love how it says in the New King James right there, it says, but we are well able to overcome it. We can certainly conquer it. Verse 31, but, hey, you're ready this time. The other men who had explored the land with him disagreed. We can't go up against them, they're stronger than we are. So they spread this bad report amongst the land of the Israelites. They said the land we traveled through and explored will devour anyone who goes to live there. All the people we saw were huge. We even saw giants there, the descendants of Anak. Next to them, we felt, we felt, we felt like grasshoppers, and that's what they thought, too. You see, this is two weeks after being removed from the grip of Pharaoh in Egypt. Two weeks after, when we see Numbers 11,

the second greatest miracle in the history of the world, only second to the resurrection of Jesus, where God takes three million Israelite people and delivers them out of the grip of slavery almost instantly because of the courage of Moses. And on the way out, they didn't leave empty-handed. They took every ounce of gold and silver from Egypt when they left. They literally walked through the Red Sea on dry ground like you were walking through the Florida Aquarium, walls of water staring at sharks and fish, walking on dry ground. And as soon as they crest the other side of the sea, Pharaoh's army comes in the water, and God breaks the levy and takes them out. And then they continue to move forward, and they settle in the wilderness where they began to grow hungry, and God rained down manna from heaven to feed them. And as if this wasn't enough, God began to send a cloud by day to keep them cool and a fire by night to warm them and guide them. And last but not least, he even provided a rock that flowed water so they would have something to drink. But two weeks later, they forgot where they came from. They complained to Moses. They murmured. They said, we missed the fish dinners and the vegetable in Egypt.

That didn't cost us anything. We missed the times that we were in Egypt, and we had these meals. And two weeks' time, they were griping at Numbers 11, and by the time they got to Numbers 13, they were negative. 10 of the spies came back with a negative report, speaking negatively of the promised land that God had promised to them, while two spies came back saying, I see the adversity, but I anticipate there's still a promise for you. And what's the difference? One group was still stuck on Egypt while the other one stepped away from it. One group was wrapped up in the past like Uncle Rico while the other one said there's got to be more, because we know God said there was more. See, the 10 spies still had their eyes on Egypt instead of excusing it. So today, I want to talk through a message that I've titled, Excusing Our Egypt. Excusing Our Egypt. And I think the Lord. Today is gonna use this word to challenge us in a deep and moving way. As I was preparing, I really felt the weight that God was gonna help some people in the room today excuse their Egypt and to walk away from their past. And I really believe that sometimes we get so loyal to the nostalgia of yesterday that we fail to see the yes of God in front of us.

And I think today God wants to help us see the potential of what could be next. And you see this story and here they are, they break free from the grip of slavery and two weeks later they're griping and they're murmuring and they're moaning and they're frustrated. And what we see is what I believe psychologists would call the first documented case of Stockholm Syndrome. And if you don't know what Stockholm Syndrome is, because I didn't know much about it until I read about it, it's actually a syndrome where people who are kidnapped or captured begin to rely and respect their captor. Because they're like, hey, don't take me away from them. They were feeding me, they took good care of me, they loved me, when the whole entire time they couldn't see the manipulation through the provision. And here are the Israelites, they're like, no, we missed the fish dinners and the fresh vegetables, forgetting the fact that for 400 years their families had been whipped and murdered and beaten and manipulated and taken advantage of. 400 years they had totally forgot and wiped out of their mind because they missed the fish dinner. I love food and I'm serious about my food. If anybody's ever cooked or been to my house when I've cooked y'all know, hey, how can I help? I'm like, you can go sit down, that's how you can help. I got this.

But I've never been so serious about food that I'm willing to go back to my past to eat. Especially when God has laid a promise right in front of me. I think we have to take a look at this and realize that the Israelites chose to acknowledge their preferences instead of their progress. They were so infatuated with what was familiar and comfortable that they overlooked God's faithfulness for their life. It was such an iconic fail and an iconic situation that thousands of years later, the Apostle Paul in 1 Corinthians 10 wrote about it. He said, I don't want you to forget, dear brothers and sisters, about your ancestors, the Israelites in the wilderness long ago. All of them were guided by a cloud that moved ahead of them and all of them walked through the sea on dry ground in the cloud and the sea. All of them were baptized as followers of Moses. All of them ate spiritual food and they drank and some drank spiritual water. They drank from a spiritual rock that followed them. This rock followed them everywhere they went. That's kind of creepy. Thank God it was something the Lord was doing. Yet God was not pleased with most of them and their bodies were scattered about the wilderness. Sadly, the majority of the Israelites never stepped into the promised land. You see, they were loved by God and they traded

everything they thought in their eyes that was comfortable to find the promised land, but just because they weren't patient to experience the promise, they traded possessing the promise for wandering in the wilderness. Where they could have excused their Egypt, they settled in familiar. And I think that sounds like maybe some of us in the room today, including myself, wilderness wandering Christians who have a spiritual Stockholm syndrome choosing to idolize what was at one time, forgetting what God might could do in another. And we find ourselves just so locked in on our past and forgetting that God has such a great plan for our life and such a promise that he made to us to push past our own personal Egypt and to step into the promise that he laid before us long before we drew our first breath, Jeremiah says. But I think there's some of us today that are ready to step over and step into the promise that God has for us. But in order to do that, we've gotta make some choices. Look at your neighbor today and say, I'm ready to make some choices. Say, I'm ready to make some choices. I'm ready to make some choices. There's three specific choices at this story the Israelites in Numbers 13 told us we needed to make. And the first one is this, we have to choose our cost.

Choose our cost. I love in Numbers 11 how they said, we remembered that we got to eat that fish at no cost. No cost. No cost? You were beaten for that fish. Your children were beheaded for that fish. You were nearly murdered regularly for fish and vegetables. But you got to eat it at no cost. It reminds me of the story of a friend of mine who really struggled through a really nasty. Divorce, and years later, I'm sitting and talking to him, like, how you doing, man? He's like, I'm just really struggling because I really miss my wife. I'm like, bro, she cheated on you like three times, and one time was with your brother. Like, that's not a good situation to look back on. I know you miss the nostalgia of what was, but it's time to press forward to what is. Because that individual forgot the cost. He forgot that that costed him his house, costed him custody of his kids, it costed him everything. And a lot of times what we'll do is we'll let a few good things mask a ton of painful things and give up everything that is not in accordance to the promise and the word of God because it's familiar. And we get so fixated on what was beautiful in the past, and it robs us of what could be even more beautiful in the future.

There's one thing that I've learned, and I'm still learning, every single day, and it's this, everything in life has a cost. And as you get older, that serves as inflation. Because it gets more and more expensive, especially as your dependents begin to grow and all the things, your expenses begin to grow. But let's talk about this practically, right? Everything in life has a cost. The first one, success versus laziness. Success might cost you picking up a few extra hours at work. Success might cost you maybe potentially some people that are not on board with all the things you need to do to continue to drive your company or your job or your life forward. Success might cost you some sleep. All the people who love to sleep did not say amen. But laziness will cost you progress every time. Laziness will cost you the joy of feeling purpose in life because your cool was just staying stuck and staying settled. Success releases potential, but lazy stops progress. What about budgeting and getting into debt? I'm speaking to myself here, right? Budgeting is hard because you got to drive the car that's paid off, but it breaks sometimes. You need more parts in that car than you would need in a brand new car. But it beats debt at an 8% interest rate. Maybe you have to live in a house

that is not the home of your dreams for a season. And you save up a down payment to buy a house that's more reliable, more affordable, more what you want. Whereas debt, you buy stuff to impress people you don't even like. And it takes years to recover. Budgeting costs the instant gratification, but debt can cost you long-term. What about God's promise and living in regret? What about God's promise and living in regret? With God's promise, destiny's not easy. The cost of obedience is high, but it's the highest ROI you'll ever find. Being obedient to the Lord, it costs you a lot. It costs you people, it costs you comfort, it costs you ambitions, it costs you yourself sometimes. You have to choose God over self. But if you live in regret, it doesn't cost you quite as much, but what it does cost you is it costs you your future. Costs you of the potential of what could be. And promise takes time to fulfill, and God's promise does, but regret, it fills us, but never fully and over the duration of our life. We never feel the filling in our life in regret than we would in obedience with the Lord. So if we choose to settle in the past instead of stepping into what's possible, we then sacrifice the easy cost,

but never seek and reap the real reward. Here's the funny thing, the Israelites, they were complaining about fish, garlic, onions, all of that. When the spies came back, what did they say? That land is bountiful. There's plenty over the Jordan and Canaan. There's vegetables, there's fruits. Look at them, we brought some back to show you. Everything that they remembered and they missed from Egypt was sitting in Canaan. They just weren't willing to sacrifice their comfort to step to it. And here's the truth that I believe we see here. Everything we need is included in the promises of God. God's not gonna call you to something and leave you void and say, good luck. It may not come in a single dispensation or a single payout, but over time, everything you need in obedience for the promise of God is found in the promise of God. God always makes a way where there seems to be no way. I love how Paul says it in 1 Corinthians. He says, no matter how many promises God has made, they are all yes to those who are in Christ. When we are in Christ, God's promise is all we need. It's all we need. May not be easy, because it's not right in front of us and it's not familiar, but it's all we need. And when we choose to excuse our Egypt,

sometimes we say bye to some things that are sucking the life out of us. But we say, God, I choose to sacrifice that because I know your promise possesses me. is all I need for myself to unlock the potential of my purpose. So God's calling us to make a choice to count the cost, but many times people like the Israelites will make excuses instead of excusing their agent. We gotta push past that and let the Israelites be a great teacher to us to choose the right costs to pay or we'll end up landing in regret instead of reward. We see this over and over and we begin to feel doubt and veer into a place of not trusting the Lord and then all of a sudden we get into this place where we're stuck and we can't push past that thing in our life, which leads us to our next decision we have to make. We have to choose our but. You see, there was a reason I kept having you say but is because you see a lot of times in this text the Israelites say the word but. You see, the 10 spies came back and acknowledged the greatness of the land, but they were mesmerized by the size of the giants. They couldn't see the promise through their perspective of what looked impossible, but then you got these two spies, you got these spunky cats, these guys that are ready to go,

Joshua and Caleb, they come back and they say, hey, we see the adversity, but we also know that God is well able to push us through to take this land as the beginning of a promised land. They could see the promise through the potential of the power of God that lived within them. Two different reports, but then the 10 spies responded and said, but we can't go up against them. They're stronger than we are. They will surely devour us. And they were 100% right because here's the deal, doubt can devour the potential to possess what is possible with God. When you live in systemic doubt all the time that it's never gonna turn, it's never gonna go your way, you're never gonna overcome it, you don't have a chance, there's no possible way, you will continue to devour the potential of destiny that God has laid before you for your life. And that's what the 10 spies did and they began to spread the negative report. Side note, bonus material, negativity spreads 17 times faster than optimism. It didn't take long for them to take 3 million people and turn them on their head to say, we can't fight those giants. And Joshua and Caleb are like, we can do it,

but nobody wanted to listen to him. And it's easy to slip into that mindset of doubt where we're constantly saying things like, man, I really know that this relationship I'm in, this person that I'm dating or that I'm engaged to, I probably shouldn't be in this relationship because it's unhealthy. But I've invested so much time to turn back now. 30 years you find yourself frustrated, broken, lost, here's a good one, church. Man, I love all the things that TC has done here in the city of Tallahassee and all the things that God has done inside of the four walls of this church, but I just wish we would quit growing so I can see my friends more. It's a mentality we have to overcome. Instead of saying that, we could say, I know it's gonna be intense on this campus if we have to add another service, but I still believe there are people in this city that are dying and going to hell. And we're okay with discomfort to open the door for them to discover the purpose of God for their life. We have to take the posture of Joshua and Caleb and stay away from the doubt of the Israelites. Because remember this, we are all well able to do exactly what God has called each and every one of us uniquely to do. It all comes down to whether or not we choose the butt of doubt and fear

or the butt of faith and joy and purpose. And choose whether or not we're gonna step into the promise that God has for us. One of my favorite authors, John Maxwell, says it this way, anything worthwhile is found uphill. If you're not willing to crest the mountain, quit at the basin. Because anything worthwhile is found uphill. And let me tell you, greater is he that is in you than he that is in this world. So there's nothing that you could possibly face that God does not wanna help carry you to and through. Because God is well able to do all the things he has called you and I to do. But we have to choose the cost and then we have to go choose our butt. Are we gonna have a butt that points to faith or fear? But lastly, we have to make a last decision. And the Israelites made this decision. We have to choose our future. We gotta choose our future. The 10 spies let their feelings and their fears choose their future. They said in verse 31, we can't go up against them, they're stronger than we are. So they spread the bad report. amongst the Israelites. The land we traveled through and explored will devour anyone who goes to live there. All the people we see were huge.

We even saw giants there, the descendants of Anak. Next to them we felt, we felt, we felt like grasshoppers. I don't have a tick there, there's a reason I said it three times. And even that's what they thought too. Next to them they felt like grasshoppers and that's what they thought too. It reminds me of what Solomon says in Proverbs 23, he says, just as a man thinks that he is. And here's the deal, feelings are real. But here's another truth in reality. Feelings have the power to define you if you let them. And the Israelites in this moment allowed their feelings to set up their future. And we choose to live by our feelings, we become fragile and fickle and flighty and fearful and scared. And that's exactly what the Israelites did, they let fear and their feelings dictate their future. Listen, I get it, I do. You might think because I have a microphone that I'm not struggling with this. There are days where I feel like a spirit empowered minister of the gospel and there are days where I feel like a chief of centers. There are days where I feel like the best dad on the planet. There are days that I wonder if my kids are better off without me. There are days my wife and I dance around the kitchen madly in love and there are days where we dance around

our problems because we don't want to confront them. But let me tell you, God is well able in all of those days to do everything he promised that he would do. We just have to choose to not let our feelings dictate our futures. Because a future fixed on feelings will fail to fear instead of faith every single time. And listen, we don't have to deny our feelings. We just have to deny them the right to be the authority in our life. I don't want you to be numb, but I don't want you to also be controlled by the thing you feel. I love how Joel says it in Joel 3.1. He says, let the weak say I am strong. Speak to your feelings. You might feel weak today, but say by the power of Christ in me, I'm strong. You might feel feeble today, but you can say by the power of Christ in me, I have a purpose today. And maybe today you found yourself and you're struggling financially, but there's sometimes where you could say I feel the financial pressure, but never have I seen the righteous forsaken. You might be going through chemo treatments today, but you can say I might be going through these chemo treatments, but I also know one thing. My God is the divine healer. You might be looking at this life that you have created here on the earth and you have all these kids and you've got this demanding job.

You say, I don't know if I can do it anymore. And feelings will try to drive you into the dirt, but you could say, but he is my portion when I am weak. He is all that I need when I am broken. Because we have to take authority over our feelings before our feelings take advantage of our future. Yeah. Church, we can't just sit still and let our feelings be the navigator of our future. Because what happens is as you begin to give into your feelings and give into fear, it begins to create an inferior self-image. And you begin to project that negative self-image on other people and on yourself. And I think that's exactly what's happening here in verse 33 when the Israelites said, next to them we felt, we felt like grasshoppers. And that's what they thought too. Whoever told them that that's what they thought. Whoever, did they ever ask and say, hey, I know we look like foreigners in this really weird land. Do we look like grasshoppers to you? No. They said, we felt like grasshoppers. So we're gonna project the inferior authority we carry onto them to think that they think the same way too. It's like, if you're saying, hey, today I don't really look cute in this outfit that I picked out for church and everybody's thinking the same thing. But then you get to church and 10 people say,

you look great today. And in your mind, you're like, thank you, no, I don't. You begin to accept an inferior report and project it on others. And it's so important we realize that if we don't gain our self-image from the word of God, we'll continue to project an inferior report and live in fear and live in lack our whole entire life because we're well able to do all that God has asked us to do exactly how we are. If we choose to leave our Egypt. And you know what the sad part is of this story is that the majority of the Israelites didn't make it out. Paul said their bodies were scattered in the wilderness. They don't even know where Moses was buried because they were afraid that they would make a shrine and worship Moses. But 40 years later, 40 years later, Joshua and Caleb made a decision that they were gonna step over the Jordan. You know what I've learned about the Jordan River? The Jordan River in the Bible, every time we see the Jordan River, stop and think. Because the Jordan River, more times than not, signifies a transition. Elijah said, Elisha, I must go over the Jordan. And when he does, what happens? He's sucked up in a whirlwind, his coat comes off, it falls on Elisha, and the public ministry continues through his mentoree, Elisha.

Jesus goes in the water, to the public's eye, he's a really smart carpenter, but he comes out of the water and he says, the time has come for me to do the work of the Father. And he goes straight to the woman at the well and begins his public ministry. Joshua and Caleb stand on the shore of the Jordan. Looking at what many generations had feared, and they said, I'm gonna step over. And I believe so many people in this room today are in a season where they're ready to step over the Jordan and finally say goodbye, Egypt. God cannot release his promise with your feet in Egypt. He needs you to step over, transition into Canaan. Say, Lord, I accept the promises you have for me. And you know what the crazy thing is when they got there? Joshua 6 tells us this. It says, when they got to Jericho, you know the story, they marched around the wall seven times, screamed and the walls fell. They possessed Jericho, strongest area. The Israelites were terrified of Jericho. It says, Jericho was tightly shut up because of their fear for the Israelites. The same people that the Israelites projected were like the giants that saw them as grasshoppers are the ones that were terrified of the Israelites. Why? Because you're well able to do all the things God's called you to do, even though you don't see it

or feel it or understand it. God has laid a path before you to step over the Jordan and step out of your Egypt. So today I just have a simple question because here's the deal. The devil is not scared of you if you continue to cling to Egypt and stare at the Jordan. He gets a little freaked out when you step over the Jordan and say, I'm moving on. I'm moving on from the past, the past of my addictions, the past of my broken relationships, the past of my hate and my hurt and all of my unforgiveness and the people that I've done. I'm moving on from that. I'm stepping over my Jordan, out of my Egypt into the promised land. That's when the devil gets scared. So I have a question today. Are you ready to step over? Are you ready to step over the Jordan into your promise into Canaan? And excuse your Egypt once and for all. Because here's what I truly believe in my heart. When we excuse our Egypt, we can possess his promise. The promises of God are yes and amen and they're for every single person under the sound of my voice and online today. I believe God has laid before you a promise. He's just waiting for you to step over Jordan. So what remnants of Egypt do you keep running to

out of anxiety and fear that you need to leave on the shore? What costs are you avoiding today to step over the Jordan that you need to pay once and for all? And what's your butt statement? What's been holding you in fear instead of faith?