In Egypt, the sun god, Ra, was
worshipped by one and all throughout the Egyptian empire. After all,
Ra to them was the source of heat and the source of light. But in this portion of scripture
that I began reading at verse 21, down through verse 23, especially,
here we find that the God in whom they trusted,
the God they rested in, was seen to be ineffective in overcoming
the darkness. Here was very clear proof. If only the Egyptian had had
understanding to see, their God was absolutely impotent. to do anything that would be
a benefit to them. And here is the God of the Israelites,
who is the creator of all things and the sustainer and maintainer
of all things, the one who made the sun and the stars that shine,
the one who said, let there be light, and there was light. Here he is, dealing with the
Egyptians in severe judgment, removing from them all light
for not one day, not two days, but three days. In fact, the
sun was blotted out by the hand of God and by the apparent vapors
that he sent. that even in their homes, it
is reported by the Jewish historians, neither candles nor wood would
burn. And they were in pitch darkness,
total darkness, for 24 hours for three days, a total of three
days in absolute darkness. And their God in whom they trusted,
could not help them at all. It reminds me of the gods that
are worshipped today by most people in religion. The God who
is typically preached and set forth, that Jesus, who is usually
proclaimed from the pulpits of America and the Holy Spirit,
whom people say is an influence only and can only do what people
let him do. We find from the scriptures that
the God, the Savior, and the Spirit that most people worship
are like the God of the Egyptians, wrong, impotent. They can't help anybody. Our Lord says in the book of
Isaiah chapter 45, why do you pray to a God that cannot save? And yet you and I have loved
ones, we have friends, we have relatives, we have perhaps companions
even, dear family members, and they do call on a God that can't
save. And such a God is useless. You
see, to us, we understand that the Egyptians calling on the
sun God, calling on Ra, Worshipping Him. We see the futility of that. We see the foolishness of that.
We see how ridiculous that is. And yet we also see something
else, that the Jesus most people that we know believe in, He is
equally as helpless to help people as Ra was. And people believe
this Jesus, they believe this God the Father, they believe
this God the Holy Spirit, the God of their imaginations, the
God that they hear about from the average pulpit, they hear
of this God that really can't help them whatsoever. I say, how pitiful is that God
who needs your help and your assistance and your permission
to do you good. That's a pitiful God. He can
do you no everlasting good. Only the God of glory can do
that. The God of salvation. Only the
Christ of the cross of Calvary, who is God Himself, God incarnate
He came and He laid down His life to save His people. It wasn't
an effort. It wasn't a futile exercise of
hopefully mercy and grace. It was a successful redemption
because the Christ of the Scriptures is God of very God. He is the
Creator. He is the Sustainer of all things. He is not helpless. He helps
the helpless. He saves the lost. That's our Christ. And this is
the gospel that we have to proclaim. Not that the Lord needs your
help, or He needs your assistance, or He needs you to validate what
Christ did at the cross by your faith. but rather we proclaim
to people Christ is the everlasting God who does his will in the
armies of heaven and among the inhabitants of the earth and
nobody can stay his hand or say unto him, what doest thou? When
He died upon the cross of Calvary, indeed, the man Christ Jesus
suffered, bled, and died, and this God-man who suffered, bled,
and died was so almighty on the cross of Calvary that He put
away all the sins of His people and brought in for us everlasting
righteousness. That is not impotence. That is omnipotence, and that's
our Savior. You remember the story in the
book of Daniel? It's one of my favorite stories
out of the book of Daniel, when Daniel was made by Darius to
be, you know, Darius chose three presidents. He had, what, 120
princes over his kingdom, and then he chose to have three presidents
over them, and then of those three presidents, he chose Daniel.
And Daniel was over all of them, a man of wisdom, a man of integrity,
a man of honesty, a man who believed God, who worshiped God, who trusted
God. The other two presidents, as
well as the 120 princes, they were all jealous of Daniel. And they concocted this scheme
of theirs, and they went to King Darius, the king of the Medes. and said, listen, you're such
a great king, you're so wonderful, and they kind of puffed up his
ego, you know. And they said, listen, why don't
you make a law for the next 30 days that nobody can ask anything
of any man or deity except for you, because you're so great. And I could just see his chest
swelling out. He said, boy, that's a good idea.
They said, sign in the law. The law of the Medes and the
Persians, sign and make a decree that cannot be reversed. He took
out his pen and he signed it. He thought everything is just
fine and he fell right into the trap that they dug for him. And
then a little later they said, You remember that decree you
signed? Yes, I do. I'm the greatest. I'm number one. They said, well,
that Daniel. I'll tell you, three times every
day, he petitions his God. He faces toward Jerusalem. Why
did he face toward Jerusalem? That's where the sacrifice was
offered. That's where God was worshiped. He faced toward Jerusalem
and he prayed to God. And they said, Daniel is one
who has violated your decree. He's guilty. He does it publicly
every day, goes to his window and faces toward Jerusalem. They
said, you know that law you signed in the decree, if anybody did
that, they're gonna be thrown in the denim lines. And the king
went, oh, what have I done? Because he loved Daniel. He said,
I have sure enough messed up now. But the law of the Medes
and the Persians was irreversible. They brought Daniel in. Daniel,
is it true you prayed to your God three times a day? Yes, sir,
old king. If you turn me loose, I'll do
it again. He said, I'm going to have to put you in the lion's
den. And of course, the king sought every which way to reverse
what he had done, but there was no reversal. A law stands, just
like the law of God stands against us. We violated God's law. It's irreversible. The soul that
sinned shall die. That's irreversible. Darius had Daniel put in the
den of lions. He told Daniel, he said, O Daniel,
thy God whom thou servest continually, he's able to deliver you from
the lions. And the king left him, and Daniel's
down there in the lion's den. King couldn't even sleep all
night. And his butlers and bakers came
to him and said, let's fix you something to eat. He said, no,
I'm not eating. He fasted. Bible says he fasted all night.
He couldn't get a wink of sleep. Worried about Daniel. Next morning,
early in the morning, he goes to the mouth of the den of lions.
He said, O Daniel, is thy God whom thou service
continually, is he able, is he able to deliver you? And he waited
for an answer. Then word came back from within
the lion's den, O King, live forever. O King, live forever. My God sent his angel. The angel of the covenant, the messenger of the covenant,
that angel, that messenger is our Lord Jesus Christ. He shut
the mouths that they couldn't hurt me just like Christ shut
the mouths of the law of God and the justice of God because
divine justice dealt with Him and punished Him and poured out
His wrath on Him. And our Lord came back from the
dead to tell us about it. And King Darius, he called for
the men to come in and said, get him out of there. And Daniel
came out and the king said, now go get the men who tricked me
to put Daniel in there. Bring those men and their families
and their children. He said, throw them all in the
lion's den. And you read the scripture, those
people were pitched into the lion's den. Their bones were
crushed before they ever hit the floor. I'm asking you, is thy God whom
thou servest able to deliver you? Ask some religionist that tomorrow. Is your God able to save? Is He able to deliver? Has He
found a way to satisfy His own justice through the death of
a suitable substitute? Our God did that. He's able to save to the uttermost
all that come unto God by Him. I remember my daddy used to preach
on that. He'd say, He's able to save to
the gutter most. To the gutter most. No matter
how deep in sin you have plunged, He's able to save. There's no
sinner too lost. but what the sovereign seeking
shepherd can't find him. And I'll tell you, some of his
lost sheep are hiding in religion. He'll find them there too, wherever
they are. It might be in a bar, it might
be in a red light district, or they might be sitting in a Baptist
church. I'll tell you what, The Lord's
arm is not shortened, it can't save. He's almighty to save. I ask you, is your God whom you
serve able to deliver, able to rescue, able to save? The God
of the Egyptians was of no help to them. No help to them whatsoever. and thick darkness. They were
in that for three days, which were like nights, three days
and nights. One writer said it's like six
nights of absolute darkness. The scripture says the darkness
was such that it could be felt But over across the way, the
Israelites, they had light. But it was through no effort
of their own. It's because the Lord shined
the light upon them in every house. I was reading one writer
today and he said some of the Israelites were even servants
in Egyptian houses outside, outside of the area that they were in,
outside of the land of Goshen. And the Jewish historians had
said where those Israelites were, they had light in their rooms.
light in their rooms while the rest of the Egyptian house was
in total darkness. You see, our Lord is sovereign
over light and darkness. He can leave you in darkness,
pitch blackness, and you'll never see a spiritual thing all of
your life. Or He can turn the light on. You see, two things are necessary
to see. Eyes and light. Eliminate either one of the two,
and you're not gonna have any sight. You may have two very
healthy eyes, but if you don't have light, you're not gonna
see anything. And there may be lots of light
around you, but if you don't have eyes to see, you're still
in total darkness. This was total darkness where
they couldn't even see one another. And it was a frightening darkness.
Hold your place here. There's a verse I want you to
look at in Psalm 78. Look in Psalm 78. The psalmist
here is talking about the various plagues that God sent to the Egyptians. It talks about how the Israelites
had forgotten the things that God had done for them. Notice verse 42, Psalm 78, 42.
You there? Psalm 78, 42. They remembered
not his hand. You know, when it comes to the
mercies of God, isn't it sad that we have short memories? We can remember uncomfortable
things, things that weren't pleasant at all. But all of the mercies
of God that are continually being rained down upon us, we tend
to forget those. They remember not His hand, nor
the day when He delivered them from the enemy, how He had wrought
His signs in Egypt and His wonders in the field of Zoan, and had
turned their rivers into blood, and their floods that they could
not drink. He sent diverse sorts of flies
among them, which devoured them, and frogs, which destroyed them. He gave also their increase unto
the caterpillar, and their labor unto the locust. He destroyed
their vines with hail, and their sycamore trees with frost. He
gave up their cattle also to the hail, and their flocks to
hot thunderbolts. He cast upon them the fierceness
of His anger, wrath, and indignation." There's the darkness. The darkness
of His wrath. When the Scripture in the New
Testament talks about people going out into hell, into eternity,
to be punished by the wrath of God, It's called everlasting
darkness. That's the wrath of God being
poured out. That's His indignation and trouble. Now watch this, by sending evil
angels among them. Know this, and I don't know a
lot about this, but we need to realize this, when God sent this
darkness to them, Along with that darkness, He sent evil spirits,
He sent demons to terrorize them, to frighten them, which is but a small taste. of what the damned in hell will
have to put up with forever, not only the blackness of hell,
which is the absence of light, the absence of God, God is light,
where God is not, there's darkness. But not only do the damned in
hell have to put up with and endure, I should say, the wrath
of God and the indignation of God, at some point, the Lord
is going to cast all the demonic spirits into hell, and they'll
have the shrieks and the howls of those demons in hell to further
torment them. And it won't be darkness for
only three days. That's an everlasting darkness. I can't imagine what the Egyptians
had to endure for three days. With blackness, darkness that
could be felt. They couldn't go outside. They
couldn't light a lantern. They couldn't build a fire. They're
there in pitch blackness that could be felt. And over across the way, the
Israelites enjoying the light of God's presence. Let me tell you something. Those
of us who have been taught the gospel of God's grace, we enjoy
the light of God's presence. But people who are in spiritual
darkness, they're under the power of evil spirits. Well, Paul says
Satan holds them captive at his will. That's what he says. What does he hold them captive
in? The darkness of ignorance and evil and sin and wickedness
and error. But Israel had light, because he who is the light dwelt with them wherever they
were. You see, Christ is the light
of his people. And though the Lord withholds
the light from many, he didn't withhold it from you. Why do you walk in the light
of His grace, the light of His mercy, the light of His presence,
when all around you are people who are in utter pitch blackness
and they can't see a thing? And things to us that are so
clear and so reasonable, the truths of the Word of God, who
God is in all of His glory, and Christ Jesus, who in His face
we see the very glory of God. We see the majesty of His person,
the wonders of His redeeming grace, of His sacrifice upon
the cross of Calvary. We see, we know, we believe,
we rejoice. We're not in the dark on who
Christ is or what He did. The Spirit of truth has illuminated
our minds and our hearts so that we know who God is and rejoice
in who He is. And we've been notified by the
Spirit of grace. He shines light on our darkened
hearts and we see ourselves and we say, oh, how we need a Savior. And we rejoice in Christ the
Redeemer. We're not in the dark anymore. I was once in the blackness of death and darkness, but now
I'm light in the Lord, and so are you. What is darkness? Simply put, it's the absence
of light. It's the absence of light. You see, God is light
and in Him, remember what it says, is no darkness at all. We are in the light. The light
is in us. But this judgment of darkness
that God sent to the Egyptians seems to me to be a clear declaration
God abandoned them. And if God abandons people, they're
dead and lost and damned while they live. And for the Egyptians, there's
only one thing left, the next plague, death. death. I remind you back over here in
our text that this darkness was for three days. The full manifestation of God's
withdrawal from them. Even as our Lord Jesus Christ
hung on the cross in darkness for three hours. the full manifestation
of the wrath of God. Those three hours in the blackness
of midnight when our Lord hung on the cross was an outward expression
of God abandoning His Son. How can that be? God abandoning
His Son? He who is light withdrew himself
from his son. We say, why, why? In fact, Christ
said, my God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? That's because God is a purer
eyes than to behold iniquity. And all the iniquities of all
the people of God were made to meet on our Lord Jesus Christ,
Isaiah 53 verse six. And God turned his face away
from the one who was punished for our sins. And our Lord Jesus
was left in total darkness. And then our Lord's body was
left in the grave. the darkness of the grave for
three days. But then the light reappeared. You know, Genesis chapter one,
you don't have to turn there, but Genesis chapter one verse
two says, in darkness was upon the face of the earth. That's
what must be said about everybody who's entered this world as a
result of the birth from a man and a woman, the union of a man
and a woman. We're all in spiritual and moral
darkness. Gross darkness, it says in Isaiah
60, verse one and two. That means thick darkness. Impossible
to see. and let the free will and the
works mongers talk about what the sinner is capable of doing,
all that they want to, but gross darkness means a darkness that
cannot be penetrated. I don't care how smart somebody
is. They can't see the things of
God apart from a divine revelation. You gotta have eyes to see. and
the light has to shine. You see, this darkness that God
sent to the Egyptians, the darkness in the Bible stands for ignorance.
Ignorance. Men don't know the things of
God. And if you talk to people in
religion, The words that they use proves that they don't know
who God is. Ignorance, listen to me, ignorance
is not the mother of faith. Knowledge is the mother of faith.
The Spirit of God teaches us. John chapter six, Christ said,
they shall all be taught of God And everyone that heareth and
seeth the sun cometh to the sun. Those who are in the dark, spiritual
darkness, they don't know, they're ignorant of the danger they're
in. They don't know. And I'll tell you, darkness in
the Bible speaks to us of Satan and his demonic hosts and powers. Colossians 1.13 says, who hath
delivered us from the power of darkness and hath translated
us into the kingdom of his dear son. Darkness. No wonder we read in
Ephesians chapter six, for we wrestle not against flesh and
blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers
of the darkness of this world. against spiritual wickedness
in high places. Satan will keep people in the
dark. That's a fact. Read again in
2 Corinthians chapter four. He's blinded the minds of people. They can't believe the gospel.
They're in the darkness of ignorance. They're in the darkness of Satan.
And thirdly, darkness not only stands for ignorance and not
only stands for Satan and his demonic hosts and powers, but
darkness in the Bible stands for sin and unbelief. If we say we have fellowship
with him and walk in darkness, we lie and do not the truth. And then darkness stands for
error. Error. You see, when we talk about the
truth of the word of God, that's light. Darkness is error. But God, according to his mercy, shine the light upon the Israelites
who were a typical people of the children of God. And when he shines the light, it shines bright. It illuminates our old, foul,
dirty hearts. And we find out who God is. We
find out who Christ is. We find out the gospel. Well, darkness and light. And of course, Pharaoh said, you go serve your God, but you
can't take your flocks and your cattle with you. Moses said,
not a hoof's gonna be left behind. That, my friend, is particular
redemption. The Lord has determined that
all of His people, everything that belongs to His people, we're
all going free. That's what Moses said. We're
all going free, even our cattle. Not a hoof's gonna be left behind. God hardened Pharaoh's heart.
Oh, by the way, have you thought about this? Give you something
else to think about this. When that darkness was over all
the Egyptians, none of the Egyptians could see their hands in front
of their faces. I wonder why the Israelites didn't
escape. You ever thought about that? I wonder if somebody didn't say,
hey, come on. We got light, they're in darkness,
let's get out of here. But God wouldn't have it to be
so. Because they're going to go out
of Egypt rejoicing in the goodness and grace of God through the
death of the Passover lamb. That's what God's ordained. And that comes up. Next Wednesday,
we'll be studying that. All right, let's sing a closing
song. Thank God we're in the light.