Sermon text: Exodus 2:23–25
The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, the love of God, the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you all. Amen.
The people of Israel were on their knees. Years of slavery and backbreaking work in Egypt had worn them down. An order from Pharaoh instructing that all Hebrew boys be drowned in the Nile didn’t help matters either. So out of the depths they cried to the Lord. Psalm 130: “The people of Israel groaned because of their slavery and cried out for help.” Those cries did not disperse into the desert air. Like all prayers of the faithful, they rose like incense to the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. So the Lord heard them, and He was attentive to their cry of mercy.
As we heard, their cry for rescue from slavery came up to God, and God heard their groanings. Much like a caring mother or father hears the cries of a young child — they don’t act contrary to what the child needs, but rather, as parents who love their children, they act in the best interest of their children, though the children may not know it — so also with the children of Israel, and the children of the church in the New Testament.
So when the Lord heard the people of Israel calling out to Him, He responded as their dear Father. Moses recorded it this way: “God heard their groaning, and God remembered his covenant with Abraham, with Isaac, and with Jacob.” To say that God remembered doesn’t mean that God had forgotten His covenant. It means that God was now taking action on what He remembered from long ago. In this case, when we read that God remembered His covenant with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, it means God had decided that the time had come for Him to act, to do something in the best interest and on behalf of His children.
A covenant, you see, is a binding promise. And six centuries before Israel’s misery here in Egypt, God bound Himself to Abraham with some grand promises. Abraham and his wife Sarah, you recall, were very old and childless. But God promised them descendants as numerous as the stars in the sky. He also promised them a land for the offspring to possess. And most importantly, the promise that ultimately through him all the nations of the earth would be blessed. That blessing to all nations would come through one particular offspring, or one particular seed, of Abraham, who was the promised Messiah, the Savior of the world. He made those promises to Abraham, and then repeated those same promises to Abraham’s son Isaac, and to Isaac’s son Jacob.
At the time of the events of our reading, more than 400 years had passed since the time of Jacob. And while Abraham’s descendants had grown into a great number to count, they were slaves, not citizens, who were living in a foreign land — not in the promised land of their own homeland. The time had come for God to put into motion the next step in His plan to fulfill His promise. As we heard at the conclusion of our reading, God saw the people of Israel, and God knew. God saw His people, and He knew, understood, was familiar with in an intimate way the suffering that His own children were being made to endure. So the time came for their deliverance from slavery.
Most importantly, the Lord knew that the time had come for Him to take the next step in the plan of saving the world, which would ultimately bring deliverance for all peoples and all nations. In the coming weeks in this Lenten season, we’ll be hearing more about how God set about fulfilling His promises. But already, when we hear that God remembered His covenant, we know that we can put a check mark: that promise is being fulfilled. For we have a God who gives promises and fulfills them, even when they’re concerning the multitude of stars in the sky.
Much like the Israelites in Egypt, we fall on our knees this Lenten night, this Ash Wednesday, acknowledging the disappointments and the pains and the pressures of life in a fallen world can be more than simply exhausting. They can be crushing, and struggling against sin can be tiring. We won’t face the same kind of slavery the Israelites did, at least by God’s grace. But the devil and the world and our old sinful nature do their best to enroll us in their service, not in the service of the new nature. We might not be bound in Egypt, but is it really any better than being caught in adverse circumstances that we can’t escape from? Is it any worse than impure thoughts and emotions like pride and anger, impatience, loss of possessions, need for people’s approval? So we, like our fathers and mothers in the faith, cry out from the depths of despair to the Lord for help, even when we don’t know how to put those words into words.
The Spirit helps us in our weakness. We are promised: for we do not know what to pray for as we ought, but the Spirit Himself intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words. That is, the Lord hears your voice. His ears are attentive to your cries. Every word you pray here. Every word you pray driving in the car on your way home. Every word you pray as you go to bed at night. Every word you’ve said to your Father in heaven from childhood to this day has been heard by the heavenly Father.
You might not feel like you’ve been heard. You might feel like that kid that’s ignored in the house — usually for good reason — but God the Father hears everything you offer in prayer. He hears, He cares, He understands, He remembers. More importantly, He remembers His promises to you. For the God who made great promises to Abraham has made exceedingly great promises to you. And the God who keeps His promise to Abraham can most certainly keep His promises to you.
The Lord has promised Abraham that he would have numerous descendants, and would give them a homeland, and that in one particular offspring all the nations of the earth would be blessed. And so it was. God fulfilled these covenant promises to Abraham. And in fulfilling the greatest of these promises, the promise of a Savior, He also established with you a new covenant. The chief blessing of that covenant was summarized in the verses spoken through the prophet Jeremiah: “I will forgive their iniquity” — that is, I will forgive you your iniquity — “and I will remember their sin no more.” That’s God’s gracious covenant promise with you, and with all who share the faith of Abraham. That is, all who share Abraham’s faith in the promised Messiah, who in the fullness of time did come from Abraham’s line.
Jesus Christ came in fulfillment of God’s promises to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. He came in fulfillment of the promise to bring the blessing to all nations. And He came to bless you in particular. He came to grant you the forgiveness of all your sins and everlasting life, promised to be fulfilled in the kingdom of heaven.
In His steadfast love and mercy, Christ took your sins upon Himself, bore them to the cross, and there made full atonement for them. He’s blotted out your transgressions, washed you thoroughly from your iniquities, and cleansed you from your sin. And in exchange for your sin, He covered you with His righteousness. He is not counting your trespasses against you. For those sins of yours He has taken away, and He remembers them no more. Now when He says He remembers them no more, God is actually saying not only does He not remember your sins anymore, but He’s not going to act upon them in any way, shape, or form. I call it divine ignorance.
Having had your sins cleansed and washed away, God does not see your real state, nor mine. Your sins have already been fully dealt with on the cross of Calvary, where Christ took the judgment of your sins upon Himself. Your forgiveness has been sealed in the blood of Christ, the blood of the new covenant poured out for you — the blood you receive at this altar. So you can be sure that God will remember not to remember your sins.
We heard this from Moses. He wrote, “God saw the people of Israel, and God knew.” That is: God sees you, His people today. And God knows you. He knows what you have gone through, and what you’re going through now. He knows your struggles. He knows your sins. He knows your sins are fully atoned for in Christ. You are forgiven and set free. And because your sins have been atoned for, no longer separating you from Him, He answers all your needs in all those struggles.
The Lord — if the Lord were keeping a record of our sins, who could stand? But with Him, on account of Christ, there is forgiveness. Psalm 130:3–4. The Lord heard your cries, and He’s answering you in Christ Jesus the Lord. For with Him, steadfast love and redemption are yours. And just as He promised, He remembers His promises and your forgiveness. God remembers nothing of your sins. Amen.
May the peace that surpasses all understanding keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. Amen.