Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Subscribe: RSS

Exodus 17:8-16 ESV

8 Then Amalek came and fought with Israel at Rephidim.  9 So Moses said to Joshua, “Choose for us men, and go out and fight with Amalek. Tomorrow I will stand on the top of the hill with the staff of God in my hand.”  10 So Joshua did as Moses told him, and fought with Amalek, while Moses, Aaron, and Hur went up to the top of the hill.  11 Whenever Moses held up his hand, Israel prevailed, and whenever he lowered his hand, Amalek prevailed.  12 But Moses’ hands grew weary, so they took a stone and put it under him, and he sat on it, while Aaron and Hur held up his hands, one on one side, and the other on the other side. So his hands were steady until the going down of the sun.  13 And Joshua overwhelmed Amalek and his people with the sword.  14 Then the Lord said to Moses, “Write this as a memorial in a book and recite it in the ears of Joshua, that I will utterly blot out the memory of Amalek from under heaven.”  15 And Moses built an altar and called the name of it, The Lord Is My Banner,  16 saying, “A hand upon the throne of the Lord! The Lord will have war with Amalek from generation to generation.”

I. POWER OF PRAYER AS WE PURSUE (8-11)
A. The fight for the hearts of others is a spiritual battle & must be fought with spiritual weapons.
B. We are all called to fight for others by both prayer and pursuit.
C. No great move of God happens apart from prayer.
D. The power in prayer is not in the praying, but in the God we pray to.

II. IT TAKES TWO (12)
A. Trying to save the world alone is a burden too heavy for us to bear.
B. To live missionally, you must be also living in community.

III. FOCUS ON WHO AND WHAT WE FIGHT FOR (16)
A. In living missionally, we seek the glory of God more than the good of man.
B. If we fail to live missionally it is Jesus, not our fellow man, that we fail to love.

IV. FOCUS ON WHO IS FAITHFUL TO FIGHT FOR US (13-15)
A. Israel defeats their enemy not just with the help of God, but also by the hand of God.
B. We are the people of God who fight the battles of God, and He fights for us and with us.

NEXT STEP
1. Moses was just a man, but Jesus as God is able to be our better and perfect mediator.