Isaiah, Chapters 63-64

Good morning. We're going to be venturing into this chapter 63 of Isaiah here. We'll be looking at verses 7 through 14 in total. First, we'll point out where are we in this thing. We've said before that chapters 56 through 66 is sometimes referred to as the Book of the Anointed Conqueror. It has a set of characteristics all its own. We today are here in the middle of this section called the Book of the Anointed Conqueror, looking at chapters 63 and 64 in broad sweep, and then zeroing in on the particular passage in chapter 63. We are two weeks away from the end of the book of Isaiah.

And we'll be done with the book and then moving on for the month of March on to, just for four weeks now, Topical, if you can imagine that. I don't want anybody to go into shock. But we will study a topic for just that month and then we'll heal ourselves and get back to studying a book.

This has not been Isaiah for Dummies. We have gone into a fair amount of detail. And so certainly that's something that you have seen if you've been with us here. And the handout continues the Isaiah not for dummies approach here. Walking the length of chapters 63 and 64, 63 begins with a description of God's wrath against the nations. This is substantially zeroed in on what is known as the future tribulation period. Then it turns to the gracious dealings of God with the people of Israel, and that is our focal point passage today.

Then it continues on after that, Israel calling God their father. I'll make a side point here, and that is Jesus referred to the Father as my Father, and that was something that was blasphemous among the Jews. It was okay to say He is our Father. among the Jews, but my father, that was not acceptable. Jesus could uniquely, however, make that statement because of his unique relationship with the father.

Okay. What's interesting is chapter 64 is like an echo of similar themes. The outline is similar, wrath against the nations, God's mercy, and then finally the people of Israel call God their father. There are some familiar themes that I'd like to point out just kind of in passing here before we go on to our focal point passage today. Isaiah 63, in the early verses, carries some similar images to Joel, chapter 3, 9 through 17, and Revelation 14, Revelation 19.

It talks about the winepress of God's wrath. In biblical times, they would take the grapes, and put them into, not always, but often a covered area. The person who is stomping out the grapes in order to get the juice, would frequently get the grape juice just all over them. Then out of a little spout as you see here in the drawing, the juice would come out into a bowl where it would be caught and captured and then taken away for storage.

And this is a picture in each case of the yet-to-come seven-year tribulation period. That's something that we spent some months covering in our study of Revelation several years back. And if you want, you can catch up with that in the online studies or request a CD.

Another familiar theme comes out of Isaiah 63.10. It says, they rebelled and grieved the Holy Spirit, something we made mention of in the First Peter class this morning.

Ephesians 4.30, Paul writes, do not grieve the Holy Spirit.

So it's a part of the comparisons that we made early on. There are a number of comparisons between Paul and Isaiah. Both of them, for example, made reference to this grieving the Holy Spirit. Both of them were martyred, basically, for their faith. And we can make a number of other comparisons. Paul speaks of going into the heavenlies, and he at first disguises it in a kind of veiled language, but talks about going into the heavenlies. Isaiah chapter 6, we saw the same thing. Isaiah was brought into the heavenlies. So here's another point of comparison between the two.

Another one, Isaiah 64.1, O that you would rend the heavens and come down. Guess what? He will. Revelation 19, 11-16 speaks of the time when our Lord will come, and as Isaiah puts it, rend the heavens and come down.

Isaiah 64, 6, about the middle of the verse there, all our righteous deeds are like a filthy garment. This is a verse that we have seen. All the very best that we do of our own self, A filthy garment. Now, Isaiah 64, 7a says, there is no one who calls on your name. Similar to the message of Romans 3, 10. And Romans 9, 21 seems to draw on Isaiah 64, 8, calling God the potter and Israel the clay. Very similar language. And by the way, if you're wondering what's wrong with this guy who's on the pottery, that's just a Harry Potter.

OK. All right. Sorry about that. Hold the tomatoes, please. OK. We're going to proceed through our passage today, verses 7 through 14. We're going to proceed verse by verse until we get to verse 11, and then we're going to take in a couple of different sections there. All right? I'm glad you lived through that last one. OK. As we proceed through this passage, some things to keep in mind.

We'll read of several aspects of God's character. His character does not change. Scripture makes that abundantly clear. Both Old and New Testaments make a number of references to that. So the truth that is told about God's character, we can take for ourselves. It is a part of our knowing who God is. It is a part of growing in the grace and knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ. Because this is His character.

We'll read about God's working in Israel's history from the Exodus onward. Isaiah will make general reference to the time of coming out of Egypt and specific reference to the parting of the sea. We'll take a look at that. And because the human need is the same and God's character the same, there are parallels that we will look at between how God worked in Israel's history and how God works with us who are in the church.

There are indeed parallels that we can draw truth from. Alright, Isaiah 63, 7 here. Let's take a look at that first verse, the one that Courtney read for us. And this verse is one of those chiasms. Now, I don't want you to go chiasm crazy, OK? But this is one of those mirror images in writing. That is, in the middle of the verse, it has a kind of a turning point and a mirror image literary pattern. We'll see what that means here. Here is that verse laid out.

It starts off with the loving kindness of the Lord. It ends with the loving kindness. The middle part there is the turning point, and the in-between part, we have a B and B' there, according to all that the Lord has granted us. And then the next part parallel to it, which He granted us, He granted them, rather, according to His compassion and according to the abundance of His love and kindness.

Okay. Here's the turning point in the middle of this chiasm. This is the reflection point, if you were to think of it in terms of a mirror image. And notice the top part has the Lord three times. The bottom part has something in comparison, but what does he do? He switches to pronouns three times. Notice also in the first part, Israel is us. In the last part, Israel is them. So some changes as he makes this chiasm, this reflective pattern in the first verse.

Notice, since we have the chiasm pattern, loving kindness at the start, loving kindness at the end. Because of this chiasm, this verse starts and ends with this focus on the loving kindness of the Lord. What does that mean? That word means His mercy. That word talks to and speaks about His love. It talks about His kindness and His goodness. These are all aspects of His character. He's talking to Israel. And though we're the church, not Israel, does that mean we can ignore this? No. It's God's character. We can take that and run with it. We can take that and learn from it. Because God does not change.

It talks about here, in the next part, the praises of the Lord. Now, something real interesting, the praises of the Lord is an occasionally used Hebrew expression. It's kind of shorthand, if you will. It means the mighty and wondrous works of the Lord for which He is to be praised. It's not talking about praising the Lord explicitly, it's the things for which He is to be praised. So, noted in shorthand.

Psalm 78.4 is one of those passages that also uses it and makes it clear that it's shorthand by spelling out the full meaning. Now, the last part of that, according to the abundance of His loving-kindness. This is a message that was stated and restated again and again by guess who? The Apostle Paul. Remember we said there are comparisons between Isaiah and Paul? The Apostle Paul restated these words. We look at, in him, that is in Christ, we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of his grace. The abundance of his love and kindness? Yeah.

The riches of his grace. Then Ephesians 2, 4-7, the next chapter in Ephesians, God being rich in mercy because of His great love, not skimpy love, not a little bit, not just a pinch, but lots, with which He loved us. Or in verse 7, that He might show the surpassing riches of His grace. As God got just barely enough grace, No. Riches of it. Wealth of grace. Think of someone who is looked upon by the public as extremely wealthy. God's way beyond that in its grace. The person who is extremely wealthy isn't going to be able to take it with them. God has it always, and He always did.

Ephesians 1.18 refers to riches of His glory.

Ephesians 3.8, unfathomable riches of Christ. What the Lord has to offer of His very character to Himself is not skimpy. The Lord is not doling out little pinches of little tiny bits because He doesn't have much. He has an abundance of His grace. Abundance. Wealth. Riches of His glory.

Notice twice in this first verse, the Lord has granted us, the Lord has granted them. God has granted Israel free gifts as gracious expressions of His infinite, eternal character. 2 Peter 1-4 says, We in the church, through faith in Christ, have also been granted free, and I'll make the point permanent, gifts as well. Here's 2 Peter. Excuse me, correction, that's 2 Peter 1, 1-4. Notice twice that Peter mentions granted again.

His divine power has granted to us everything. Granted to us a few things? Granted to us a couple of items. Here's your will. Here's a thimble and the core of a spool of thread. No. Granted to us everything. Are you caught short spiritually? No. Verse 4, For by these he has granted to us his precious and magnificent promises. Granted is a free gift. That's one thing to take note of here. An absolutely free gift.

It's not, be good enough and you'll earn it. You'd better be really, really good or you won't get it. No. It's a free gift. You can't earn it. We talked about this morning Paul wrote at the end of Romans 6, if you want death, you've got to work for that, that's wages. But if you want life, that's free, you can't earn it. Here's the point, granted in 2 Peter and in this Isaiah passage in chapter 63, both of them, free gifts.

The second thing here in this passage, it's in the perfect tense, it implies permanence. granted, and then, I'm sorry, I didn't act very well, I'm going to take that away. No. It's irreversible. He granted it not to be taken back, not to be reversed, or dropped out, or diminished. There's nothing you can do, there's nothing I can do, there's nothing anybody can do that will diminish that, or change its permanence.

That's the character of it. Notice one other thing. Who's the promise keeper in verse 4? God is the promise keeper. In the middle of that, great goodness towards the house of Israel. Not a little bit of goodness, but great goodness. This great goodness of God is expressed towards Israel. The book of Nehemiah, which takes place a few centuries after the time we're reading of in Isaiah, has the same basic expression that's used in verses 25 and 35 of that chapter. Now, for your Hebrew lesson. Are you ready for your Hebrew lesson?

Okay. You've got to get your mind sharpened up here, because this foreign language stuff is a little bit wild. Okay, you ready for this? Alright. Now, look at that. The Hebrew word for goodness is tube. Can you say tube? Tube. Hebrew scholars, everyone. That's fantastic. Okay. Now, loving kindness. You know how to say that. I'm kidding. Come on. Alright. Here we go. Compassion.

One other aspect of God's character here, that this verse brings forward is His compassion. And that's an important thing to note. God isn't just pulling the levers of the universe as if it were some big machine. God isn't just standing dispassionately on the outside saying, I wonder what will happen. He isn't just gathering data about us.

Here's verse 8, "...for He said, Surely they are My people, sons who will not deal falsely. So He became their Savior." God led the people of Israel out of slavery in Egypt and through the sea, all in good faith. The Lord is not ignorant of what's going to take place. He knew in advance that they were going to bail, that they were going to go off and even serve other gods. What is he saying here? He says, I will deal with you in good faith. You may be faithless, but I will deal with you in good faith. Yeah. So he became their savior. God was gracious. That's what he's saying here.

The only place it's interesting where it's explicitly at a certain event says that God saved Israel and tied it to an event is this one in Exodus 1430. where he brought them through the sea. We'll find later on in this passage specific reference to the Lord bringing Israel through the sea. Jude 5, now I desire to remind you that though you know all things once for all that the Lord after saving a people out of the land of Egypt, the Lord saved them out of the land by taking them through the sea. Here's in this verse one of the points we want to make is that As we see in the Old Testament, Scripture introduces the Gentiles and Israel.

We've seen the Gentiles and Israel as themes brought through the book of Isaiah as we proceeded through it. We're going to see that all the way to the end. The Church is not brought out until the end of the Gospels. The end of the Gospels and into the rest of the New Testament. The end of the Gospels, important point to make. So what we're going to see in Isaiah is he's going to tell us about Gentiles, he's going to tell us about Israel, he's going to tell us about Christ's first and second comings. He will not give us details about the church because that's not revealed until the time from the end of the Gospels into the rest of the New Testament.

Okay. If we look at this, ultimately God calls those who believe of the Gentiles, that's an ethnic distinction, that is nations and peoples, of Israel and of the church. He calls them all my people. The Gentiles, you can look to Zechariah chapter 2, 10 through 12 there. Israel, we see it right here in Isaiah 63, 8. And Ezekiel 37, 24 through 28. And of the church, 1 Peter 2, 9 and 10. Now, we look at verse 9 of this passage.

In all their affliction, He was afflicted. Now wait a minute. How does that happen? Here's all these things that these people went through, going from Egypt into the Promised Land, and when they were afflicted, the Lord was afflicted? How did that happen? If you think about that, this is amazing. The Lord does not just stand on the outside and collect data about us.

Years ago, At my folks ranch, we had an area where especially during the summertime, there would be a couple different colonies of ants. I used to have lots of fun watching the ants. I'd get tired because that was the place where we'd pick rock to put on the road. We did it by hand except for a few times. It was a lot of work. So I'd take a break and I'd watch the ants. Occasionally I'd do things like I'd take ants from this colony and drop them over in the other colony just to see what would happen. It was usually pretty exciting. And then I'd see the ants working real hard and watch the things that they were getting as food, and then I'd go up and grab lots of that food and dump it right on top of their, you know, home. And, of course, that got them excited too.

But the Lord is not doing that with us, okay? The Lord isn't doing just some sort of cosmic experiment. Oh, look! See, burn squirms when I do that, okay? The Lord is not just doing experiments with us. The Lord is not just trying to see what will happen. The universe isn't just some sort of cosmic scientific experiment. The Lord isn't just trying to prove out some theory.

No, as we examine the pages of the New Testament, something very interesting comes out. I want us to take a look at it, because very similar to in all the affliction he was afflicted, we find that truth true in the church as well. Let's take a look at it. Here is Acts 9, 1-5, and you'll see that on page 3 of your handout here, the same thing.

Saul still breathing threats and murder, and by the way, this is later, Paul the Apostle. Here's Paul, who wrote over a dozen books of the New Testament, was the one who was breathing out threats and murder. Later on in the book of Acts, he says, wherever I had a chance, I voted for death.

He was a hardliner, okay? He went to the high priest, asked for letters from him to the synagogues of Damascus, so that if he found any belonging to the Way, that was the name for Christians, or one of the names, both men and women, he was not a chauvinist, he might bring them bound to Jerusalem. As he was traveling, it happened that as he approached Damascus and suddenly a light from heaven flashed around him and he fell to the ground and heard a voice saying to him, Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting? What's the question? Me. Wait a minute. I thought it was the believers. Wait a minute. Let's go back. The believers, the disciples of the Lord, were getting the persecution.

Why is the Lord asking this question? Guess what? Next verse, and he said, who are you, Lord? And he said, I am Jesus, whom very directly you are persecuting. When we suffer, does the Lord stand dispassionately and separately up in heaven and say, tsk, tsk? No. The Lord takes our suffering personally and very subjectively. Why are you persecuting me? Isn't that amazing? Their afflictions. He was afflicted. Let's make this personal. In all of our afflictions, the Lord is afflicted.

How about that? How about that? Amazing. There's a key principle here, a key spiritual principle. We do not suffer alone. Remember that. This principle can be spelled out in more detail this way. We share in His glory because He is determined to share His glory with us. He shares in our sufferings. And we in His. About that.

The Lord does not stand apart like I did with the ants and say, I wonder what will happen. And in the end, well, you know, I looked at the ants and I said, well, that's interesting. And I went back to my picking work. The Lord is not like that. He is not playing little games and experiments with us. He's not wondering how we'll respond. In everything that we're going through, He is very well aware of what's taking place. Persecution? He takes it personally. He takes it personally. Key point to remember, isn't it?

Now, the next part, the angel of his presence saved them. This shows up only here in all the scripture. Nowhere else in scripture can I find the same phrase used. But, it's very likely, and I think almost certainly, a reference to the angel of the Lord, Jesus Christ, before his incarnation. The angel of the Lord shows up about 50 times in the Old Testament, from Exodus chapter 3, and it shows up before, but starting with Exodus chapter 3 to the end of the Old Testament, once Christ is born, never again.

Isn't that something? Appears to be Christ incarnated before being born as Jesus Christ, our Savior. Okay, next part. In his love and in his mercy, he redeemed them. We read of two aspects of God's character. God has an infinite eternal character, his love and his mercy. Those do not change or diminish over time. Those don't get corrupted or distorted. Those don't ebb and flow.

God redeemed the people, Israel, which meant that he took the steps to bring them out of Egypt. That's what his redeeming Israel meant. To bring them out of Egypt, what did he use? He used plagues. He redeemed them to bring them out of Egypt when he parted the sea. When he provided them food and water, he redeemed them. When he made their clothing and their shoes not wear out the entire time. Can you imagine? I need some new clothing. Sorry, those are going to last you 40 years. And guidance. A pillar of fire by night and a cloud by day.

The Lord provided all those things out of what? Because they deserved it so much? Because there were such really nice people. Ah, they're cute. No. The Lord redeemed them out of His love and His mercy. That's why. He redeemed you. Here we see God redeemed Israel. What one nation on the earth is like your people, Israel, whom God went to redeem for Himself as a people and to make a name for Himself and to do a great thing for you and awesome things for your land before your people whom you have redeemed for yourself from Egypt from the nations and their gods. We were redeemed as well.

How about that? Here's 1 Peter 1, 17-19. In verse 18 there, it says, you were not redeemed with perishable things. The Lord didn't just lay down money. Verse 19, but with the precious blood as the blood of an unblemished and spotless. The blood of Christ. A perfect lamb. Galatians 4, 4 and 5 also says that we believers were redeemed from the law. Isn't that something? The Lord redeems Israel and gives them the law. The Lord redeems us and redeems us from the law. Amazing. And by the way, an important distinction.

The last part of verse 9, He lifted them and carried them all the days of old. This is Isaiah's figurative language here. What is he doing? He's summarizing the way in which God delivered and protected and provided and guided the people of Israel when he took them out of Egypt, delivered them from there, and brought them through the desert and into the promised land. That's when he lifted and carried them. Verse 10 here.

Haggai 2.5 says, As for the promise which I made to you when you came out of Egypt, my spirit is abiding in your midst. Do not fear.

The Jews did not have, as we have, a promise of universal, that is in the church, there is universally in every believer the indwelling, permanent indwelling of the Holy Spirit. Every single believer. That universal promise the Jews did not have at this time. But there was, as they came out of Egypt, the Holy Spirit among them, in their midst. It says, do not fear. So these people of Israel had this ministry of the Holy Spirit as the Lord was bringing them out from Egypt. It says, the Holy Spirit's with you. Don't be afraid.

Guess what? They were anyway. They rebelled. And we'll see what happens next here. By the way, there was a listing of ministries of the Holy Spirit. I think it's a great, concise listing. I have several copies. This is a special handout that's available on the cabinet on the right as you exit this room if you want a copy of that. It was something that Hal put together some years back, and I think it's a great one. So feel free to take advantage of that if you like. If you run short, let me know. Make sure you get one. OK.

The last part, he turned himself to become their enemy. He fought against them. Wow. The people of Israel, after going through the Red Sea, that forever changed them. They never did anything wrong after that, right? Not so much, okay? They did all kinds of things wrong. They were out in the desert, and so this rebellion took place several times during their history there.

And so we see a similar statement here in the Ephesians passage, verse 30 in chapter 4. Do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God by whom you were sealed for the day of redemption. Which is, by the way, something that the church is promised three times in Paul's writings. So we have the seal of the Holy Spirit that's not given to the Jews in the Old Testament explicitly.

Okay. Now I have some questions here in this next part. Here we see a series of questions like we had before in Isaiah, which were intended to invite the reader to participate in the thought process. That's something we'll see a number of times in scripture. The Lord could have made things, you know, just statements. Here's a statement. Here's another statement. Here's another statement. But a number of places we see questions.

Isaiah has done this more than once. So we've seen this before. questions or the language written such that it's inviting participation. It's one of the reasons why the Apostle Paul, for example, will say, if and then since. He assumes oftentimes that the if statement is true, but the reason for it is to invite us to participate in the thought. And that's what Isaiah is doing here. He's asking questions to get them to think and put their own mind to the truth that's being laid out there, to refresh their memories.

I need to have that happen sometimes. Now he makes reference early on here to the days of old. This gives confirmation that Isaiah was writing about the time of Moses because in the days of old of Moses, specifically about that. When he used the same days of old phrase in verse 9.

Notice about this Moses thing, just while we're talking about Moses, I imagine Moses as an infant. You can just envision that, trying to give Moses a bath. Or if Moses grows up a little bit, here's another one. Moses first and last day as a lifeguard. That's rough. Okay. All right. Back to Isaiah. Isaiah asked questions.

Where is he who brought them up out of the sea with the shepherds of his flock? Where is he who put his Holy Spirit in the midst of them, who caused his glorious arm to go at the right hand of Moses, who divided the waters before them to make for himself an everlasting name, who led them out of the depths?

These questions are all about the Lord. They're all about when the Lord delivered the people. Look at the references to the Lord here. It's pronouns often. And yet, when you look at it, what's the intent here? The intent, as you go through these, is to put the focus on the Lord. Ask questions. Use pronouns. To what? To draw people's thoughts and hearts to the Lord. What could be better than that? What a great thing. He asks very good questions. All the questions point to the Lord. Every one.

The last part of this passage here, like the horse in the wilderness, they did not stumble as the cattle which go down into the valley, the spirit of the Lord gave them rest. So you led your people to make for yourself a glorious name. Now, so here's the horse. Here's the cattle. What's that about? Okay. So we look at this passage here. He is using the horse and the cattle as, here's the horse walking through the wilderness, not stumbling.

When Nancy and I lived in Nevada, there's something like 60,000 wild horses living throughout the West. And about half of those are in Nevada. So we saw quite a few wild horses when we were in Nevada. And they're very sure-footed animals going through all these rocks and sagebrush and rough ground, rough terrain.

So that's used as a picture of sure-footedness. As you went through the sea, here you are with big walls of water on each side of you, Egyptians behind you, and you made it through okay. And the cattle which go down to the valley, as they go down, what? To rest and to eat.

The Lord took care of you all the way through, every step. Were you in danger? No. Did the Lord provide for you? Yeah! Did you stumble? No. He says, I made sure you went through just fine the whole way. So you led your people to make for yourself a glorious name. This completes the picture. All the questions, remember the questions? The questions were there to put their focus upon the Lord. Why? Because in the end, when it's all done, God led them faithfully in order that they might fulfill God's eternal purpose. We pointed that out before. To reveal and to declare His glory. To share His glory. That He might be glorified. That He might be glorified. And that's what this ends up with. To make for yourself a glorious name. An everlasting name.

We could look at this passage that we frequently are drawn to in Ephesians 1.3. Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. Now, this blessed be, the Greek is eulogitos, right? And of course, that makes us think of this, right? Eulogitos. Okay. Now forget that. All right. It means good wording or good messaging. Okay. I know, I know Wayne shaking his head. Okay. All right. You'll get over it. All right.

The every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ. is for every single one of us who have believed. Because of the Lord's doing, and nothing more than belief, the Lord has placed us into the body of Christ. We have been blessed with every spiritual blessing. Did the Lord bless Israel?

Even in spite of the fact that they were often rebellious? Yeah. Abundantly. Was He incredibly gracious? Yes. Imagine, here's a sea on one side. You've got All your stuff and carts and horses and babies and mothers and grandmothers and grandfathers. And then the Egyptian army is coming on the other side. That doesn't look so good. The Lord says, no problem. No problem. I'll take care of it. Incredibly gracious. Unfathomably gracious. It is He who is deserving of the glory. Blessed be the God and Father of the Lord Jesus Christ.

Isaiah called for the people of Israel to remember their history by God's doing. Remember this. Remember in Isaiah's time, this was about seven centuries past. So it would be like us looking back on something around the year 1300. So seven centuries passed by the time Isaiah writes this.

He says, remember this, the Lord long ago, showed his faithfulness to you. He showed his graciousness, his mercy, his loving kindness to you, his love for you. The apostles have called us to remember our history in Christ. They did it often. We saw it again this morning, even in 1 Peter. Our history in Christ is what the Lord has called us to. That's also by God's doing. We don't have a history in Christ because we decided, hey, you know, I think I'll go back and be identified with Christ on the cross.

I think I'll pull that off. Could you pull it off? Not so much, right? I think if I work at it, I can be identified with Christ in his resurrection. That would be cool. I can do that. No. It's by God's doing. It's His accomplishment. And who gets the glory for it? His glory. All to His glory.

See, this calling to remembrance isn't just for the sake of sentimentalism. This isn't just something that grabs your heart because we're sentimental. Our blessings, that all come from our history in Christ, have an immediate impact on the way we live and by whose life we live. What did Paul say? It's no longer I who live, but Christ who lives. Our blessings directly impact the nature of our hope.

We're not crossing our fingers. We're not crossing our eyes. We're not throwing money down a wishing well. We don't have that kind of hope. Our blessings are untouchable in the heavenlies, irreversible, certain. A certain hope, not an I hope so hope. Our hope is certain. This calling to remembrance points to a particular location. Where are we blessed? In the heavenlies, in Christ.

Our blessings, like we saw in this passage in Isaiah, are all by grace, by God's doing. God didn't say to Israel, you folks have been so good, you've earned the parting of the sea. You've been so great that I owe it to you. No. All by grace. All by grace.

And yet, they're unfathomable. God's riches of grace and glory. Riches, wealth, abundance of His character for us. All to His glory. Let's pray. Lord, as we look at this passage, Your grace just overflows. The riches of Your grace. It's certainly appropriate. The abundance of your loving kindness. How awesome and how phenomenal. We thank you for it. We praise you for it. We pray that you would draw our hearts, the eyes of our hearts, to see and understand these things. In Jesus' name, Amen.