Everywhere I Go, I am There
October 26, 2003
Exodus 3:1-11

When we last saw our hero...

Christian, the pilgrim in The Pilgrim's Progress, had been pointed toward a narrow gate, carrying a terrible burden on his back, and seeking to escape his city, the City of Destruction, and find his way instead to the Celestial City which he has read about in his sacred book. Going along with him is his neighbor Pliable. Both are excited about the journey ahead. Then, even before they find the gate, this happens:

"Now I saw in my dream, that just as they had ended this talk they drew near to a very miry slough, that was in the midst of the plain; and they, being heedless, did both fall suddenly into the bog. The name of the slough was Despond. Here, therefore, they wallowed... and Christian, because of the burden that was on his back, began to sink in the mire.

"[Pliable] angrily said to his fellow, ‘Is this the happiness you have told me all this while of? If we have such ill speed at our first setting out, what may we expect betwixt this and our journey's end? May I get out again with my life, you shall possess the brave country alone for me.' And, with that, he gave a desperate struggle or two, and got out of the mire on that side of the slough which was next to his own house: so away he went, and Christian saw him no more."

Today I want to show you how, spiritually speaking, we can be our own worst enemies sometimes. The Lord sees our distress, shows us pity, makes a way of escape, but our own errors can cost us the game.

This Slough of Despond is the first example of this. What is it? That's what Christian himself wants to know, of course and, after he is pulled out of it by a man named Help, he asks about it and receives this explanation,

"...As the sinner is awakened about his lost condition, there ariseth in his soul many fears, and doubts, and discouraging apprehensions, which all of them get together, and settle in this place. And this is the reason of the badness of this ground."

Fears, doubts, and discouraging apprehensions bogged down the pilgrim, literally, from the very start of his journey, and they can do the same to us.

There is a second example in this story of how we can be our own worst enemy.

Finally, Christian gets back on the road, but he doesn't get very far – not even as far as the wicket gate to which he has been pointed – when he meets up with a pompous man named Mr. Worldly-Wiseman, who is not the least impressed either with the little book in the pilgrim's hand or the advice he had received from Evangelist. He seems sympathetic about the burden on Christian's back and offers this advice as to how to be rid of it,

"Why, in yonder village -- the village is named Morality -- there dwells a gentleman whose name is Legality, a very judicious man, and a man of very good name, that has skill to help men off with such burdens as thine are from their shoulders: yea, to my knowledge, he hath done a great deal of good this way; ay, and besides, he hath skill to cure those that are somewhat crazed in their wits with their burdens."

Christian, who is too green in his spiritual life to know the difference between good advice and bad advice, takes this word from Mr. Worldly-Wiseman and heads out to this town called Morality. The problem is that it is at the top of a road too steep to travel with the weight on his back. He struggles on to the point of near exhaustion when Evangelist, the man who first pointed out the way to go, finds him and chides him for wandering off the path.

It's very important that we are clear about what this detour toward Morality represents, and to do that we can take a pause from the story and look briefly at the story of Moses in the Bible.

Last time I said that we can find some interesting parallels between the adventures (and misadventures) of the mythical Christian and the true-to-life experiences of the great lawgiver Moses.

First, let me take one quick step backwards. Remember the Slough of Despond? Remember that it represents "fears, and doubts, and discouraging apprehensions"? We all struggle with such things, as did even great men and women of the Bible. Listen to part of the story of Moses and the burning bush, and see how he was himself bogged down in that very slough.

Exo 3:1 Now Moses was tending the flock of Jethro his father-in-law, the priest of Midian, and he led the flock to the far side of the desert and came to Horeb, the mountain of God.
Exo 3:2 There the angel of the LORD appeared to him in flames of fire from within a bush. Moses saw that though the bush was on fire it did not burn up.
Exo 3:3 So Moses thought, "I will go over and see this strange sight--why the bush does not burn up."
Exo 3:4 When the LORD saw that he had gone over to look, God called to him from within the bush, "Moses! Moses!" And Moses said, "Here I am."
Exo 3:5 "Do not come any closer," God said. "Take off your sandals, for the place where you are standing is holy ground."
Exo 3:6 Then he said, "I am the God of your father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob." At this, Moses hid his face, because he was afraid to look at God.
Exo 3:7 The LORD said, "I have indeed seen the misery of my people in Egypt. I have heard them crying out because of their slave drivers, and I am concerned about their suffering.
Exo 3:8 So I have come down to rescue them from the hand of the Egyptians and to bring them up out of that land into a good and spacious land, a land flowing with milk and honey--the home of the Canaanites, Hittites, Amorites, Perizzites, Hivites and Jebusites.
Exo 3:9 And now the cry of the Israelites has reached me, and I have seen the way the Egyptians are oppressing them.
Exo 3:10 So now, go. I am sending you to Pharaoh to bring my people the Israelites out of Egypt."
Exo 3:11 But Moses said to God, "Who am I, that I should go to Pharaoh and bring the Israelites out of Egypt?"

Can't you just see him sinking down into the Slough of Despond? You would think if God appeared so convincingly to him that he would respond right away, but no such luck. In fact, Moses dragged his feet time after time as the Lord repeatedly called him to service. Moses complained, "What if the people don't listen to me," "I am not an eloquent speaker," "Can't you find someone else?" He had no confidence in his own abilities, and worse, he evidently had no confidence in the Lord's either.

So, Moses was his own worst enemy, which can happen to anyone. But, even more importantly, Moses represents the very problem that Christian encountered when trying to apply the advice of Mr. Worldly-Wiseman. Christian is told to seek out one named Mr. Legality in the town of Morality. In other words, he is offered legalism as the solution to his problem.

Legalism is, simply put, a misuse of rules and laws. Of course, rules and laws are indispensable in all of life. You couldn't play a game of soccer without them. You couldn't play music without them. You couldn't drive down the street without them. There is no religion, including Christianity, that doesn't have its rules and laws. The issue is where they come into play with regards to salvation. Do they lead the way to salvation, if they are first strictly followed? Or do they flow out of salvation, once it has been experienced? The former is the way of legalism. The latter is the true Gospel.

The hardest thing in the world is to climb that steep mountain with that impossibly heavy burden on your back, but that is what much of religion will instruct you to do, including, I'm sorry to say, some forms of so-called Christianity. The seeker is directed to clean up his or her life. That's good advice, if you mean getting off drugs or breaking off an adulterous relationship. But to the legalist it means much more than that. There is ever-growing pressure to pray more, meditate more, attend more meetings, give more money, make more sacrifices. And the bar keeps rising higher and higher to the point where not even Jesus Christ could keep all the rules.

Speaking of Jesus, he ran into legalism like a buzz saw. The religious leaders of his day delighted in taking the law that Moses had given and continually "improving" upon it, making it a monstrosity that no one could bear. But this, they said, was the way to God.

Moses himself may not have been a legalist, in fact, but he became associated with legalism because of the set of laws he delivered to Israel.

Why does legalistic religion hold such appeal? Because it puffs up the ego. You are led to believe that the answer lies within your power. Maybe you have to give more, or try harder, or work harder, but you can do it. That has a certain appeal to us since we live in what may be the most egocentric culture of all time.

The Gospel is the antidote for legalistic religion. This is illustrated in Christian's experience of finally ridding himself of his heavy burden. It happens like this. Christian, after being saved from legalism by Evangelist, finds his way back on to the path and, sure enough, finds the narrow gate to which he had been directed. The gatekeeper allows him to pass and directs him along until he comes to the sight of a cross. This is how the story goes at this point,

"[Christian] ran thus till he came at a place somewhat ascending, and upon that place stood a cross, and a little below, in the bottom, a sepulcher. So I saw in my dream, that just as Christian came up with the cross, his burden loosed from off his shoulders, and fell from off his back, and began to tumble, and so continued to do, till it came to the mouth of the sepulcher, where it fell in, and I saw it no more."

Legalistic religion teaches you to work harder to fix what's wrong with you. The Gospel says that you can't fix what's wrong with you, no matter how diligently you try. It says that Christ can fix it, and that's what the cross is all about.

The radical nature of the cross is that it works wonders for those who have stopped looking to themselves for answers. On the other hand, sadly, it does nothing for those who feel they are fine without it. Where do you fit in?

Wouldn't today be a perfect day for you to stop playing games? Why not just admit that you can't fix the problem and quit pretending? It's a hundred times harder to live by complex rules in order to win God's favor than to surrender to Him and accept the forgiveness that He freely offers.

Now, I don't want to say that the way of Christ is always easy. In our story, Christian has finally found release from the burden on his back, yet there is much treachery that awaits him, as we will see next time. The difference is that now he will be able to face it all with confidence – not confidence in himself, but confidence in the Lord. And once you have found that you are ready for any challenge.