Matt Chandler - From Bitter to Sweet

Well, good morning! It’s good to see you. If you have a Bible, go ahead and grab it—Exodus chapter 15. It’s hard to believe that this is our 17th week in the book of Exodus. We’re going to round out or land the plane on what we can call Exodus part one. Over the next month, we’ll be out of Exodus, but we’ll come back in February. From the first weekend in February through the last weekend in May, we’ll look at Exodus chapters 16 through 40, which will be our year-long study in Exodus. I love that we’re concluding the fall series in Exodus with Exodus 15, which is essentially a song of praise to God. When we first saw the people of Israel, they were in bondage, on the receiving end of genocide at the hands of a lunatic tyrant. Their children, their sons, were being thrown into the Nile River; they were being raped, beaten, pillaged, and destroyed. Yet the people of God continued to grow, demonstrating that the best laid plans of men are rendered impossible next to the power of God. Now we end this part of the book of Exodus with the people of God liberated from bondage and slavery, celebrating the goodness and grace of God through a song. Most of Exodus 15 is actually a song that they sang, along with some other historical pieces around it.

Let me set up Exodus 15 like this: there are over 400 verses in the Bible about singing, and there are 50 explicit commands related to singing. If we pause for a moment, that’s an unusual command mixed in with all the other commandments—50 times, right? Don’t murder, and sing; don’t touch another man’s wife, but sing; don’t steal, but sing. It’s a peculiar idea to think that there are so many commands about singing. Now, for those of you who like to sing, you might love those commands. But what I’ve learned is that there’s a certain group of people who really enjoy singing at church; they love it. Maybe not just at church, but they just love to sing. However, that’s not the case for most of us. Most of us don’t really like to sing. In fact, it has been my experience over the last 14 years that many of us think that singing is some sort of addon to the proclamation of the Word. «Hey, just get to the Bible and skip all this glee nonsense! Just open up the book—give me the book!» Yet we make great efforts here to ensure that we’re singing the Bible, reading the Bible, and preaching the Bible, allowing the Bible to shape and inform all that we do.

In fact, there have been times that I don’t know if you’re aware of how churches function, but we are often really evaluating everything we do and whether we, as elders, pastors, and ministers, are doing all that we can within the context that God has placed us to serve you well, being fully obedient to Scripture and what God would have us do. We noticed several years ago that when we finally stopped turning away from our six services, you guys would actually start showing up about ten minutes late, missing some of the singing. So, we thought, «This is really important—I mean, 50 commands in the Scriptures.» We want to help you experience what God would have us experience in the singing of the Word of God congregationally.

We decided to move singing to the end and used it as a response to the proclamation of the Word. Then, man, y’all were shady! I’m just going to put it out there. I would be here with Bleer trying to lead you in worship, and I would pray and say «Amen,» but y’all would gather your stuff right in front of me and bail out the door while he was trying to sing to you! So, I thought, «Turn the lights on—just keep the lights up.» Yet all that did was help Bleer see you bail on him. Now, I’m in the back trying to cheer that brother up and saying, «We serve the Lord; we don’t serve you! You matter before Jesus; just rest in the grace of God.» We don’t sing to empty seats or to peg people; we simply proclaim the goodness of God to all who will hear and respond. I think I understand why, in 2016, it’s hard for churchgoers to really get into singing. Once a year, I take my daughters on a special date. I try to date them often to prepare them for any schmuck out there who might have weak game. I’m just setting them up to win so that they aren’t blown away when a door gets opened for them. They won’t be surprised when flowers are brought; they’re expecting that.