Just Move On - Exodus 14:15

By Odon Bulamba

Exodus 14:15, Then the Lord said to Moses, “Why are you crying out to Me? Tell the Israelites to move on”.

This is a very short but powerful message.  Imagine you are crying to God and He says, “Why are you crying? Just move on”.  Very often we believe the last result will only come from God and when things don’t work the way we want, we come to Him and He says, “It’s too much, I’ve heard you crying a lot, it’s time to move on”.  Imagine if you as a child are crying in front of your dad, and he says, “move on stop crying”.  Maybe you will feel he doesn’t care.

When the people of Israel were leaving Egypt and it was time for them to say goodbye to Egypt.  As they were leaving, God went by His own power to harden Pharaoh’s heart to deliver them from slavery.  The Israelites were happy, “We are free now”, but God said, “Not yet”, and He went to harden God’s heart to make him angry.

Imagine that you are now a Christian and you are free but a sin becomes hard to resist again in your life.  Why does he allow such challenges?  I was around 14 when I asked myself, what is the purpose of my life on this earth?  I was a good student and I wanted to be a pilot because of the prestige.  Then a plane crashed and I decided it was a wrong choice, I wanted a safer job that was paying well.  Whatever I chose, there were consequences e.g. a doctor might accidently kill someone.  Therefore, I asked, what is my purpose to be here?

We can study all night and then only get 40% for the test.  We can ask ourselves why.  God wants us to discover that He has a purpose for us and it’s not our purpose.  You can plan to be someone but God has a plan that we will be something else. 

Pharoah was given a task to attack the Israelites.  He took 600 best chariots to attack them and go after them.  Chariots have horsemen on them that are warriors and well trained to kill.  A simple person like you and I, if we saw 600 police with guns, we will feel scared.  The Israelites saw this group of people coming after them and they know that they can’t run faster than horses.  They were in panic.  In this panic God told them, “Why are you crying to me, just move on?”  How can I move on when soldiers are coming on horses to kill me? 

I was in a hotel one time and the fire alarm went off and I walked into the wall because of fear.  Everyone was shouting fire and I wanted to push the wall to escape.  When in panic your brain doesn’t function properly.  We shout during that time and God will say, “Move on”.

How many things have been attacking you in your life and how many challenges are in your way and you cry to God and He is silent. You pray and tell God your problems but He tells you move on.  You can’t do more than what you have done and God tells you, “Move on”.  When your neighbours don’t like you and God says, “no move on with that relationship”. 

When the time came, God told Moses, “What do you have in your hand?  The red sea opened using the staff in his hand.  Even if it is just the Waikato river with a path and water on each side, I won’t pass.  When we fear we don’t take the risk.  You can tell someone to climb on the roof and fear can make them think twice because of the consequences. 

When you think about the consequences for God’s purposes you fail.  You must live like children who don’t think about consequences.  They can play with a knife.  It is up to you to protect your children.  Whatever we do is controlled by God and we are protected by Him.  When you sleep and you snore, you feel good but when someone wakes you up, you will be annoyed or when the alarm goes off early in the morning, you feel you need to sleep.  God is in control of all of that.

Accept it or not, even if it is dark, the light will show outside.  You will see the sun in the morning appearing.  No matter what challenges you face, the sun is rising soon and God will end your problems.  Don’t stand still, move on.

What direction?  What area?  In God’s trust.  You have faith, continue to trust in God and follow what you believe is right and don’t be influenced by what others think is right for you.  That is the purpose of your life.  You might be a Doctor of Medicine, or have a PhD, or be a mother but one day we will go back to God and He will ask us a few questions.  We can never say, “Because you hardened the heart of others against me, that is why I failed”.  God will never accept that, He will say that was a test.

When it is time for a test at school, it is up to you to answer the questions. When the test comes, you are split up from each other and you can’t take a cheat sheet.  When a test comes you must be frank with yourself.  This is the test, answer what you can.  God will every time hold a red pen to mark and don’t be shocked when you see red marks and notes everywhere.

When you get a result from the teacher with red everywhere, you will feel bad.  You look at the mark over 100 to be afraid it will be less than 50% due to all the marks.  When you see red from Jesus don’t be surprised if you get 70%.  God is a good teacher who give us marks to improve.  When you fail, ask God for forgiveness.  Are we ready to go in front of God with our test for marking?  Are you ready to be marked in front of the entire world?

I was watching America’s Got Talent.  People are trying their best to perform to impress Simon Cowell.  Although we have four judges, all the people only want to know what Simon will say.  Their mind is only with Simon. If Simon stands up and claps, people will cry.  When Simon says, “What you have done is amazing”, the crowd goes crazy.  I’ve seen once, Simon push the golden buzzer and people were shouting and the parents were crying.  That is a performance in front of a human being.

Now think of yourself performing in front of Jesus.  You are performing today.  What are you doing right now?  Does it impress God.  Does your day to day impress God to make Him push the golden buzzer or do you not care?  Many people live like clowns to make people to laugh but they don’t laugh themselves. They try to impress others but they don’t impress themselves.  I have seen a clown being tough on his family with no laughing.

You can be a Christian, nice outside of your family but how are you inside with your family?  Kids can talk with their friends for 2 hours but never have 5 minutes to talk to their parents.  All of this, God is marking.  He is reminding you to move on in the right direction.

We may not be alive tomorrow.  We don’t know what will happen.  Exams or tests will always have a set time.  A three hour exam will have questions with a series of questions.  You can be short or tall, fat or slim, the exam will be the same for all of us.  You can never tell God, I didn’t have a Bible, or a didn’t have time to read it, how often do you have time to chat with God, how often are you on your Facebook page with God and inviting others to your group with God.

We must make disciples of men.  I have 15,000 followers on Leo Nj Leo but others have 1 million.  If I could take those 15,000 to Christ, that would be good.  God will ask me one day about this.  You have the skills to bring your friends to God.  We can easily make friends but not disciples of Christ.

We can create a Facebook group and only talk about our own things.  Some want to talk only about Jesus.  We want to only show our photos and videos of ourselves.  One time in my dream, I saw social media and I was told to post a few things on that and as I was posting my friends were mocking me, “it is boring”.  When other people post stupid things, people are happy and they share it with others.

That is a test for us. When we have a test we have to think about how to answer the question so we can get good marks.  One day God will ask about your Facebook because our actions and faith must work together.  I don’t say that Facebook is bad but is it possible to turn it to God’s purposes.

Give to God all the thanks and glory.  Pharoah came after the Israelites.  There was no way to escape.  That is when miracles happen when there are challenges.  Don’t give up your faith because of circumstances.  Don’t give up your God because of problems.  Move on.  Even where there is no way, move on.  If God tells you, go through that wall, move on.  God may open that wall for you.