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GOD IS KEEPING HIS PROMISES ON HIS TIMETABLE, FOR HIS GLORYExodus 9:13—35INTRODUCTION A couple of weeks ago I was standing in line at the Post Office. The two people behind me began to complain about how long they had to stand in line. They questioned the decision to only have two workers working at that time. They challenged the work ethic of government employees. T hey passed the time waiting in line to complain about and protest having to wait. All of us have expressed our impatience at some time or other. We’ve all challenged the intelligence, work ethic, moral integrity, etc. of those who make us wait. We are impatient waiting in line, waiting for the car to be fixed, waiting in the doctor’s office, waiting for supper to be ready, waiting for the microwave to heat the water, waiting for the remodeling to be finished. For most of us, patiently waiting is not one of our virtues. We have more important things to do than stand around waiting. I don’t think it is any different in our relationship to God. We simply don’t like to wait. We hear his promises to save us from our sins and when we keep struggling with our anger, we question his power. We hear the story of how Jesus has turned around the marriage of a friend and we wonder what’s wrong with God that he doesn’t change mine. We hear that Jesus has come to save sinners and we wonder why he hasn’t saved our child or spouse or parent. We read about the miraculous healings that Jesus performed and hear stories of other people who are healed and yet we endure a long illness and so we challenge the love of God. All of us naturally question the pace at which God is working out his plan for our life. Much like the two individuals who were behind me in line, we know that if we were in charge things would be getting done much more efficiently. It is for impatient people like us, who demand an answer to the question, “ Why is this taking so long?”, that today’s passage is written. In this passage we discover why and how God is working out his plan to save his people. He tells us that he could make things go faster but he doesn’t so that his reputation will be made great in the universe. God says that he could have ended this contest with Pharaoh long ago. He could have wiped out Egypt with one plague and so freed Israel. However, he is slowly, on his own timetable working so that Pharaoh knows his power and so that his reputation in the world is made great. What we see in this passage is what God patiently does in order to make sure that his name is made great in all the earth. MAIN POINT God is working on his timetable to increase his reputation in the world, therefore… I. He asserts his sovereign freedom (vv. 13-18) For several months now Moses and Aaron, on God’s behalf, have been commanding Pharaoh to let the people of Israel go free. Pharaoh has refused to do so and thus God has sent six miraculous signs or plagues to show Pharaoh who he is and who it is that he is resisting. These plagues have been troublesome but not fatal. Pharaoh continues to resist God because of his hard heart, which we were told in v. 12 (4:21 & 7:3 also), was hard because God himself hardened Pharaoh’s heart. Once again in v. 13, Yahweh commands Moses to get up early and to confront Pharaoh. However, what he wants Moses to tell Pharaoh is very different from anything that he has said up to now. He begins by repeating the same command he has given on at least 4 other occasions, commanding Pharaoh to let Israel go. However, he goes on to explain to Pharaoh, in great detail, what is happening and why it is happening. Verse 14 literally says, “Because at this time I am sending all my plagues into your heart and your servants and your people in order that you might know that there is no one like me in all the earth.” In other words, God tells Pharaoh that he has been playing around up to this point but that beginning now he is going to, as it were, drive a knife into his heart. He is going to deal a fatal blow to the Egyptians. Why is he doing it now? Why didn’t he do it before? Are the Egyptians worse now than they were before? Is Israel more deserving of deliverance at this time than prior to this? The reason he is going to give this fatal blow at this time is so that they will know that there is no other god in the entire universe. He alone is God and to make that point required all that has happened up to this point. In v. 15 he makes the point even more clearly. He tells Pharaoh that the reason Israel is not free, that Egypt is not wiped out is simply because he didn’t want to wipe them out or free Israel, yet. He has a plan that he is working out that includes Israel’s suffering in slavery and Pharaoh’s hard heart and obstinate refusal to let them go. The reason Pharaoh keeps resisting and Israel remains in slavery is not that God is not able to release them but because he has a more important goal than merely releasing Israel. What is the reason? Verse 16 tells us. God tells proud Pharaoh that he exists, he is king of Egypt and he is able to keep Israel in slavery because Yahweh raised him up, because God put him in this position. Every thing he has, every decision he has made, everything that has gone into making him who he is and what he has, God did. God has given him life and enabled him to successfully resist him so that Pharaoh would know whom it is he is dealing with and so that God’s name would be made great in the universe. Then, in vv. 17-18 God tells Pharaoh the specific trouble that he is going to send upon Egypt. He is going to send the worst hailstorm that has ever fallen upon Egypt. He tells him the very hour he can expect it, 24 hours after the announcement, how extensive it will be, over all of Egypt and in a revelation of his eternality, he tells him it will be worse than any that has ever come upon Egypt since its founding. He knows this fact because he has ruled over Egypt since its founding. Here again is a powerful revelation of God’s sovereign rule over all of creation. Here’s the really important question to my mind. Why does God tell Pharaoh this? It’s one thing for God to tell Moses, as he repeatedly has done, that he is the one who is hardening Pharaoh’s heart. It’s one thing for Moses to inform us, his readers, that God is the one who hardens Pharaoh’s heart, that everything is happening just as Yahweh said. God wants his people to know that when God’s enemies successfully resist him that we should not fear. When it appears that evil people are gaining the upper hand in the world, we do not need to tremble. God raises up evil people to make his power known and to fill the earth with the knowledge of his glory. Men are not in control of this world, no matter how it appears or what people say. God rules over the evil choices of evil people in such a way that their evil choices fulfill his perfect and good plan. Yet he does this in such a way that he is not guilty of doing evil. Such is the glory of the God who made the world and sustains it and wisely governs it so that all things serve his purposes. This story of God’s contest with Pharaoh is a clear statement of this fact for every believer to know and rejoice in. However, why does he tell pagan, non-Christian Pharaoh that he is in control? Yahweh tells non-believing Pharaoh that he exists by God’s decree and that he resists by God’s decree in order to humble Pharaoh. God has given human beings the gift of choice. We make decisions every day about all sorts of things. As a result, we naturally believe that because we make choices, we are in control. It is the assumption of every human being that we are in charge of our own destiny. Pharaoh presumes that Israel is under his control. Human beings exult in our supposed “freedom”. We are at the center. We act as though God is supposed to fit into our lives and our plans rather than us fitting into his plan. What the doctrine of God’s sovereignty over human choice means is that we are not in control. We are not in charge. I know that this is why God tells Pharaoh because this is exactly how the apostle Paul uses verse 16 in Romans 9. We just had it read for us. “It does not therefore, depend on man’s desire or effort but on God’s mercy. As the Scripture says to Pharaoh, “I raised you up for this very purpose, that I might display my power in you and that my name might be proclaimed in all the earth. Therefore, God has mercy on whom he wants to have mercy and he hardens whom he wants to harden. One of you will say to me, ‘Then why does God still blame us? For who resists his will?’ But who are you O man to talk back to God? Shall what is formed say to him who formed it, ‘Why did you make me like this?’ Does not the potter have the right to make from the same lump of clay some pottery for noble purposes and some for common use?” The knowledge that God sovereignly, freely decides whom will be saved and who will be damned humbles us. The knowledge that God has mercy on whom he wants to have mercy and hardens whom he wants to harden is meant to put us in our place. We are powerless before this great and sovereign God. There is no one and nothing like him in the entire universe. He alone is to be feared and worshipped. He is in control of the universe, not us. He does not answer to us, we answer to him. We live in his world, he does not live in our world. God tells Pharaoh and he tells us that he is in charge of Pharaoh’s heart in order to destroy his pride and to destroy our pride. We are nothing. He is everything. We are to boast in him alone, not in anything in us or about us. We are to tremble before him. God is working on his timetable to increase his reputation in the world, therefore…
II. He deals with people mercifully (vv. 19-21) There are three evidences of God’s mercy in vv. 19-21. First, he gives Pharaoh and his people a 24-hour notice of when the devastating hailstorm will begin. In other words, Pharaoh has time to repent, to let Israel go and so avert the disaster. The second evidence of his mercy is that he tells the people of Egypt that they can escape the full force of God’s wrath by bringing their slaves and livestock into the shelter of houses and barns. The hail is coming but there is a way to escape the full impact of the hail. Third, knowing what we know about God’s relationship to human hearts we see that God has mercifully enabled some of the Egyptians to fear his word. Some of the Egyptians have concluded that Moses really does speak for God and that the only safe course of action is to do what he says. We can’t be 100% sure that these people are actually converted from paganism to the worship of the one true God. I think it is quite possible because when Israel leaves Egypt we are told that many Egyptians joined themselves to the people of Israel and left Egypt with them. Regardless of whether or not these Egyptians are actually converted or they are simply recognizing that obeying God is the safest way to live, this is an expression of God’s mercy. These same three mercies are still being expressed in the world. God is continually calling every sinner to repent and to believe the gospel. The promise is true that whoever calls on the name of the Lord will be saved. Every moment of every day both by creation and by proclamation of the gospel God reminds people that they are accountable to him and that while they live there is yet time to turn. In addition, God tells people how to be ultimately saved and how to avoid the full brunt of his wrath in this life. He has placed all manner of consequences in the world to restrain human sin. Governments, parents, other authorities, venereal diseases, accidents, drug addiction, divorce, and all kinds of miseries express God’s wrath against human sin in this life. He tells humans how to live so as to avoid many of these miseries. Most people fear being arrested or getting a venereal disease or destroying their life through drug addiction and so they refrain from behaviors that would expose them to these dangers. Most people fear homelessness and hunger so they work hard and teach their children to work. God mercifully helps most people make good choices so that they do not experience the full brunt of his opposition to sinners in this life. Some of his enemies he even enables to come to fear his word and so escape the final and greatest judgment, hell itself. God is working on his timetable to increase his reputation in the world, therefore…
III. He gives experiences of his justice (vv. 22-26) God sent the most severe storm that Egypt had ever known. A wall of massive thunderclouds swept over all of Egypt. Over all the land of Egypt, except Goshen, where Israel lived, the hail rained down on man and beast. Lightning flashed, the thunder roared, and the rain poured down. The hail fell on the slaves and animals who were in the field because their owners did not fear the word of the Lord given through Moses and killed them. Every green plant was flattened and the trees were shattered by the power of this storm. It was not like a normal thunder cell that is limited in its coverage and duration. This storm covered hundreds of square miles and didn’t let up in a few minutes, as is usually the case. Some of us have been in fierce thunderstorms with damaging hail. They are full of shock and awe. Back in June, in the middle of the night a thunderstorm rolled through Janesville. A lightning bolt struck one of the massive Norway spruce trees in Oakhill cemetery behind our home. The clap from the thunder was so violent that I literally woke up and jumped out of bed. The next day we looked at the tree. Pieces of the tree were blown 100 yards from it. The entire girth of the tree from about 15 feet above the ground was peeled of its bark and there were huge chunks of wood missing from the trunk. A foot deep furrow in the ground went from the base of the tree out for about 10 feet. A tree next to it, about 20 feet away was missing some of its bark from a part of the bolt jumping through the air to it. The power that was unleashed by this one lightning bolt was enormous. There were hundreds of such lightning strikes in Egypt on this day along with large hail and torrential rain. The language that is used here to describe this attack of God is very similar to that used in Genesis six describing the rain pouring down for forty days and forty nights to flood the earth. It is also very similar to that used to describe the Lord’s raining fire and brimstone down upon Sodom and Gomorrah in Genesis 19. In addition, some of you may know that in the book of Revelation, in chapters 8-9 and 16 the vision of John describes God’s judgment upon the world with very similar language to this. In fact, John uses the language of the historical plagues upon Egypt to describe God’s fierce judgment upon the whole world. The purpose of God’s end time judgments on the world is the same as the plagues, to cause people to recognize God and repent of their sins. In Revelation 9:20-21 we are told, “The rest of mankind that were not killed by these plagues still did not repent of the work of their hands; they did not stop worshipping demons, and idols of gold, silver, bronze, stone and wood—idols that cannot see or talk. Nor did they repent of their murders, their magic arts, their sexual immoralities or their thefts.” I said this a few weeks ago, but it bears repeating. When we witness or suffer from creation run amok, we are to see these as warnings of wrath. These are rumblings of hell that God sends to us to get us to repent of our sins. When we suffer due to our own sin or when we are victims of God’s curse upon the world, we are to see in the suffering a warning from God that there is worse to come if we do not repent. This is exactly how Jesus used calamity in Luke 13. Do you remember? A crowd of people asked him what he thought about the Galileans that Pilate the Roman governor had butchered while they were offering sacrifices in the temple. He had the soldiers cut up their bodies and throw them on the altar of burnt offering. Jesus’ answer tells us one of the ways we are to think about every story of tragedy that we hear. He said, “Do you think that these Galileans were worse sinners than all the other Galileans because they suffered this way? I tell you, no! But unless you repent, you too will all perish. Or those eighteen who died when the tower in Siloam fell on them—do you think they were more guilty than all the others living in Jerusalem? I tell you, no! But unless you repent, you too will all perish.” Or remember what he said to the man he healed who was an invalid for 38 years as recorded in John 5. He told him to stop sinning or something worse would happen to him. What could be worse than being a paraplegic for 38 years? Going to hell would be worse. God is sending all these plagues upon the Egyptians to reveal himself and to bring about repentance and faith. Some of them actually fear him, but not all. Not everyone learns the lesson. I beg you, for your own sake, to learn the lesson that the misery of this world is meant to communicate. Stop sinning or something worse will happen to you. Repent or you too will perish. God is working on his timetable to increase his reputation in the world, therefore…
IV. He bears with great patience the objects of his wrath (vv. 27-35) We know something about Pharaoh as readers that only God, Moses and Aaron know in the story. Pharaoh is never going to repent. God has determined to destroy him and send him to hell. God is not treating Pharaoh unjustly. Pharaoh has despised the God who made him and gave him everything he has for his whole life. He has done nothing to deserve or earn God’s kindness. So God justly has determined to destroy him, yet he continues to display his power and kindness to him to show his own glory to him. He is out to show how right it is for him to destroy unrepentant sinners by showering Pharaoh with overwhelming evidences of his power and his love and yet Pharaoh persists in resisting him. We’re going to spend a few minutes pondering Pharaoh and his response to this hailstorm and God’s response to his response. However, before I do so I want to make something very clear. We know that Pharaoh is an object of God’s wrath, prepared in advance for destruction because God has told us so. We do not know this about any living human being. You cannot know about any human being, including yourself, whether God has determined to send them to hell or not. In fact, every living human being should presume that God wants to save him or her because he sent his Son into the world to die for sinners. The promise that is held out in the Bible is this, “whoever believes in the Son has eternal life.” “The Son of Man has come to seek and to save that which was lost.” “This is a trustworthy saying, ‘Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners.’” “I did not come to save the righteous but sinners.” If you know yourself to be a sinner, then you have everything you need to qualify for salvation. There is no reason to not trust in Christ. Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved. I urge you to come to Christ. Do not let anything hold you back. Forsake your sin and trust in the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ to be the sufficient payment of your debt and to gain for you perfect righteousness before God. However, the fact of the matter is that not every sinner is saved. That means that God is patiently bearing with all those who stubbornly refuse to come to Christ and who continue in their sins. He is patiently bearing with the objects of his wrath who have been prepared in advance for destruction as Paul says in Romans 9:23. This is true for Pharaoh. God has told him that he is doing all this so that Pharaoh would know him. He offers Pharaoh the opportunity to repent. Pharaoh does not repent because he doesn’t want to repent and he doesn’t repent because God has determined make Pharaoh’s heart hard. Yet, Yahweh continually holds out to him the offer of salvation. God continues to patiently put up with the insubordination of Pharaoh. I don’t think it took very long for Pharaoh to flee to Moses with his confession of sin when he observed the overwhelming display of God’s hail, lightning and thunder. Notice what he says (this is a literal translation), “This time I have sinned. Yahweh is righteous and I and my people are wicked. Pray to Yahweh for we have had enough thunder and hail. I will let you go; you don’t have to stay any longer.” There is so much to see in this confession of Pharaoh. This sounds like thorough and complete repentance and surrender to God. He openly confesses his sin, that the Lord alone is righteous and that he and his people are wicked. He tells Moses that the people of Israel are free to go. He shows that he believes that only God can deliver him from the wrath of God. He knows that the hail is due him for his sin and he knows that God will listen to Moses and deliver him from his own anger. Verses 27-28 are as clear of a statement of the gospel as you will find in the OT. I am a sinner. God is perfectly good and just. I deserve hell as the just consequence of my sin. However, God has given one who can intercede for me, who is a man like me and if I ask him, he will pray for me and God will listen to him and deliver me from his just judgment. Could you describe the gospel better than that? However, there is also something in what Pharaoh says that tips us off that while he sounds like a converted sinner, he really is not. He says, “ This time, I have sinned.” What does he mean, this time? Didn’t he sin when he subjected the Israelites to slavery, when he butchered their babies, when he refused to give them straw, when he refused to let them go the previous six times, when he lied to Moses on two other occasions? Here is a way to know if you have been truly converted to Christ or if you are a hypocrite. Do you openly acknowledge all your sins or do you only admit to some of them? Are you defensive when you hear that something you enjoy is shown to be sin by the word of God? Do you think that you are not that bad? Do you think that you are better than others, that your sins are not as offensive as those of say, a homosexual or a drug addict? Do you think of yourself as a sinner or as a person who makes mistakes once in awhile? Notice, Moses does not miss this slip of the tongue by Pharaoh. He tells Pharaoh that he will do as he asks. He will ask the Lord to stop the hail and the Lord will stop it. However, he adds, “But I know that you and your officials still do not fear the Lord God.” Moses knows this is not true repentance and faith, it is just words. Once the terror of God’s judgment is removed, Pharaoh again hardens his heart and will not listen, just as the Lord has said, because he does not fear the Lord. You have had times in your life when you have, because of some great trial or difficulty, cried out to God and begged him to deliver you. You have earnestly sought him in prayer and Scripture. You have sought to live as a Christian. But now, the terror is gone. Are you still seeking him? People who are truly converted don’t stop seeking Christ when the trouble is gone, when they’ve gained the earthly comfort they were seeking. True converts seek Christ persistently because they want to know him, not just escape some earthly discomfort. There is another thing you need to see in this response of Pharaoh and then God to Pharaoh. We have been told repeatedly that Yahweh hardened Pharaoh’s heart, that God raised up Pharaoh for this purpose, that everything is happening just as the Lord said. In short, we have seen that God is sovereignly ruling over Pharaoh’s choices. Yet, both Pharaoh and Moses say that Pharaoh sinned by not letting Israel go and then by changing his mind after the hail was gone. Pharaoh is guilty of sin. When you are trying to understand the relationship between God’s control over human choices and human responsibility for our choices, there are two errors to avoid. First, we are not fatalists. The fatalist says that it doesn’t matter what I do or anyone does because God always gets his way. We are like robots. Resistance is futile. What I do doesn’t matter. You act like a Hindu who believes in Karma, which is that everyone is getting what they deserve and human choices don’t matter. That is a lie. Every choice you make matters and you will be held accountable for every choice you make. That is the point of Pharaoh’s confession and Moses’ agreement. I want to help you to think about whether you are a fatalist or believe in biblical sovereignty. Fatalism produces passivity in living and an indifference to the suffering of others. Do you regularly excuse your sin or lack of earnest pursuit of Christ because God hasn’t given you a desire to stop sinning or pursue Christ yet? Are you waiting for God to give you a feeling, a desire to obey? Are you indifferent to the sufferings of others because God is sovereign? Do you simply tell people that God is sovereign when they complain about their pains and miseries? Or more likely, when you hear people complain of their suffering do you think, “God is sovereign, get over it?” Listen to me, the strongest statement of divine sovereignty in the Bible is Romans 9. Do you know how Romans 9 begins? Paul says, “I speak the truth in Christ, I am not lying—my conscience also confirms it in the Holy Spirit: I have great sorrow and unceasing anguish in my heart for the sake of my brothers, those of my own race, the people of Israel.” People who understand God’s sovereignty weep over people going to hell and over the sufferings of others. Fatalists do not weep. The other error is to say that humans are completely free and that God cannot do anything about human choice. In order for humans to be held accountable, they must be free from all control outside themselves. God cannot interfere with human choice or he cannot hold us accountable. If God interferes then we are merely robots and we know we’re not robots, therefore it is my decision that determines my fate. That also is a lie. Pharaoh is guilty of sin because he is doing exactly what he wants to do but he is also doing exactly what God wants him to do. God hardened his heart and Pharaoh hardened his heart. Both are true. Pharaoh is guilty of sin, even though God hardened his heart. People in this camp often lack compassion for those who struggle with sin because they figure people are sinning because they aren’t trying hard enough. They are arrogant about their own goodness because they believe they are good by their own effort. Often, those who live consistently with this belief don’t pray because God can’t interfere with human choice and so what’s the point of praying. Finally, I want you to see what I think is the most frightening thing in this passage. Pharaoh pleads with Moses to intercede on his behalf. He confesses his sin and agrees to obey God. Moses prays for him and God stops the hail. However, notice in v. 30 that Moses prays and God stops the hail even though Moses and God both know he does not fear the Lord. In other words, God has mercy on Pharaoh, he answers his prayer even though he has no faith and does not truly repent. God is merciful to him now, even though he intends to destroy him later. That’s also the point of vv. 31-32 where we find out that the hail destroyed some of the crops but not all the crops. Mercy is extended to Pharaoh even though Pharaoh is doomed to destruction for his unrepentant heart. God is kind for his own reasons, not because Pharaoh has repented. This kindness of God is not due to God’s desire to save Pharaoh but part of his plan to reveal his glory and show how right it is for him to destroy Pharaoh in the end. Here is why this is frightening. How do you know that God loves you? Is the evidence that God loves you that he healed you of a sickness one time or spared you from a bad accident? Is it because he gave you a Christian husband? Do you know that God loves you because you live in a nice house and have nice children and a healthy body? I often hear Christians explaining that they know God loves them because of how kindly he has treated them here on earth. Listen to me, just because you have asked God to give you a good life here and he has answered your prayers, does not mean that he loves you and is going to save you. The way you know that God loves you is that he has made you one of his people through the death of his son. The greatest gift he can give is Christ for your sins. Knowing that Christ died for you and that you belong to God by his gracious work is the only way you can know with certainty that God loves you. You cannot tell from the circumstances of your life how God feels about you because God is merciful and kind even to those whom he has determined to send to hell, like Pharaoh. We know we are loved by God when Christ is better to us than everything else, when our faith is in him alone. God is working on his timetable to increase his reputation in the world, therefore…
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2004 John Swanson. |