Exodus chapter 15

2 The Lord is my strength and my song; he has become my salvation. He is my God, and I will praise him, my father's God, and I will exalt him.

3 The Lord is a warrior; the LORD is his name.

11 Who among the gods is like you, O Lord? Who is like you— majestic in holiness, awesome in glory, working wonders?

26 He said, If you listen carefully to the voice of the Lord your God and do what is right in his eyes, if you pay attention to his commands and keep all his decrees, I will not bring on you any of the diseases I brought on the Egyptians, for I am the Lord, who heals you.

Two things here.

Firstly, what a great song of praise and worship to God this is. Sometimes, when God is at work in our lives, it is easy to be so overwhelmed, so overawed, that we forget to say thank you, to give Him the praise. Yet everything we have comes from God, and without Him, no matter what the size of our house, the money we have in the bank, how well things are going for us, in reality we have nothing. You cannot take a bank balance to heaven, or treasured ornaments, or the clothes you are wearing.

The Lord God, Father Almighty, the great creator, King of Kings, He is the one who is our strength and our song. He brings music to my heart and a song to my lips, for there is no one like Him, omnipotent, omnipresent, ever faithful, true to His word, slow to anger and quick to forgive, compassionate and merciful, righteous and just, and full of never ending love.

Who among the gods is like you, O Lord? Who is like you - majestic in holiness, awesome in glory, working wonders?

The Israelites came out of Egypt after witnessing the ten plagues, they were being chased by Pharaoh's army and walked between two walls of water through the Red Sea. Yet within three days, they were complaining bitterly to Moses. They had pushed to the back of their minds just how great and awesome and powerful God is, the miracles they had seen, the power of God clearly demonstrated before them, and they became engrossed in their immediate problems. The bitter water was a source of grumbling and discontent as they chose to ignore god and focus on Moses as the source of their problems. After all, he was the one who had dragged them their from the comfort of their homes in Egypt and brought them into the wilderness where there was no drinking water, where they were all probably going to die. They failed to trust in God who had rescued them from with such clear demonstrations of His power and might. Instead, they chose to focus on their temporary discomfort and ignore all that God had done for them.

I see the same pattern being repeated today in the lives of so many Christians, including myself. It's like when Peter got out of the boat and walked towards Jesus on the water. For a short while, whilst his eyes were on Jesus, he was walking on water. As soon as he looked around, saw the size of the waves, the storm around him, and realised that he, a mere man, was doing the impossible and walking on water, he started to panic. He let his head take over from his heart and he took his eyes off Jesus.

I have been doing that recently, letting the cares and worries of this world blind me to all that God is doing in my life. It is easy to feel overwhelmed by life, to let the everyday problems get us down. Sometimes, it just seems like there is too much going on around us and that we are all alone, sinking in the swamp of our lives and letting the enemy convince us that we can never cope, can never do all that is facing us.

Yet God is with each and every one of us. We may not have the pillars of cloud and fire before us, but as Christians, we have the Holy Spirit living within us. We need to remember this, to spend time in the word of God, to trust in Him. When we take our eyes off Jesus, when we let the cares and worries of this world take over, when we believe the lies of the enemy that we are worthless, useless, and will never do anything for God, that our prayers are not as good or as meaningful as the prayers of others, then we are behaving just like the Israelites here in the wilderness. We are believing the enemy, the powers and principalities against which we are in a battle, and allowing him to have his way in our lives.

Ephesians 6:12 For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms.