Exodus chapter 9, verse 8. And the Lord said unto Moses
and unto Aaron, take to you handfuls of ashes of the furnace and let
Moses sprinkle it toward the heaven in the sight of Pharaoh. And it shall become small dust
in all the land of Egypt. It shall be a boil breaking forth
with blains upon man and upon beast throughout all the land
of Egypt. And they took ashes of the furnace
and stood before Pharaoh. And Moses sprinkled it up toward
heaven. And it became a boil breaking
forth with blains upon man and upon beast. And the magicians
could not stand before Moses because of the bowls. For the
bowl was upon the magicians and upon all the Egyptians. The Lord
hardened the heart of Pharaoh, and he hearkened not unto them
as the Lord had spoken unto Moses. And the Lord said unto Moses,
rise up early in the morning, and stand before Pharaoh and
saying to him, thus saith the Lord God of the Hebrews, let
my people go that they may serve me. For I will at this time send
all my plagues upon thine heart and upon thy servants and upon
thy people that thou mayest know that there is none like me in
all the earth. For now I will stretch out my
hand, that I may smite thee and thy people with pestilence, and
thou shalt be cut off from the earth. In it very deed for this
cause have I raised thee up, for to show in thee my power,
and that my name may be declared throughout all the earth. And
I'll stop my reading there with verse 16. Let's seek the Lord's face in prayer. Thank you, O Father, that you
have left this marvelous record of thyself for us. that we may,
in these pages of inspired scripture, learn of our great God and Savior,
learn of your ways, learn of your holiness, learn of your
commandments, and learn of our inabilities, of our sinfulness,
learn of our iniquities and transgressions, And the book of God that we're
so thankful for, it reveals to us the only way whereby we can
draw near to Thee, and that is through our Lord Jesus Christ,
through His blood, through His sacrifice,
through His own atoning work, whereby He satisfied for all
of your people infinite justice, whereby He paid the penalty for
our sins, and He established for us, brought in for us everlasting
righteousness. We're thankful that our Savior
satisfied your every demand, and now we have a legal right
to this great salvation. Our Savior has fully paid all
the indebtedness we owed. That ransom by divine justice
that was demanded has been fully satisfied. And in, through, and
by our dear Savior, we are accepted forever. Thank you for your marvelous
grace Thank you for redeeming us by
your Son. Thank you for the revealing work
of the Holy Spirit, teaching us the gospel of Christ, teaching
us of how God can be just and justify the ungodly. Thank you for the work of your
Spirit within us. We would have no spiritual life
or understanding apart from his omnipotent work in our hearts. Lord, you've been so gracious
to us and you continue to be. Your providential care is truly
marvelous. And we may not always understand
the direction that your Wisdom takes us, but we always know
that our God is concerned about us fully. Nothing shall ever
happen to us that shall endanger or harm us in any way. We're
thankful that we're under the watch care of our Lord all the
time. We're grateful. As we meet tonight,
give us a spirit of wisdom, a spirit of reverence, a spirit of worship. May we render to you tonight,
Father, that glory that is due to Jehovah only. May we never seek to take any
honor to ourselves. We're just sinners saved by the
grace of God. All that we are and all that
we hope to be, we owe dear Lord unto thee. So bless tonight those
of our congregation who are hurting. Some are sorrowing, some are
recovering. Some are experiencing the feebleness
of old age. Whatever the case may be, may
we all be encouraged to know that our lives are under the
constant watch care of our God. And the God of Israel, he neither
slumbers nor sleeps. And ours is a blessed condition
for you make all things to work together for the good of your
dear people. So speak tonight through your
word as it goes forth and bless these dear ones who are gathered,
those who are watching by way of the internet. I pray that
you will meet the needs of all of us and indeed you will according
to your sovereign purpose. And we're thankful that you'll
never leave us alone. You're always with us. Bless
our church family. And tonight as we gather, may
the word of God go forth in power. These things I ask in the name
of our Savior and for his sake. Amen. Moses and Aaron had obediently
carried out the commands of our Lord to tell Pharaoh on numerous
occasions Thus saith the Lord, let my people go. We're to go out into the wilderness
and worship him. We're to have a feast unto him.
We're to render unto our God a sacrifice out in the wilderness. But thus far, Pharaoh virtually
pays them no mind, and to the carnal eye, To the natural eye,
the servants of the Lord had so far labored in vain. I mean,
nothing is really being accomplished as far as changing the mind of
Pharaoh. He's not going to release the
captives. His heart is hardened, and God
has hardened his heart. You see, neither the judgments
of God nor the mercies of God in taking the judgments away.
So far, there have been six different plagues that God has sent. Neither
the judgments nor the reversal of the judgments have tended
to soften the heart of Pharaoh. The judgments themselves made
him angry. He felt pain. He has gone to
Moses and said, please take these things away. The judgments, though,
didn't soften him because when God, according to His sovereign
purpose, according to His mercies, removed the plagues, the mercies,
they didn't soften him either. Neither the judgments nor the
mercies did anything as far as changing Pharaoh and his attitude
toward God and toward Israel. In verse 15, therefore, Moses
takes up a more, I don't know how to express it, kind of a
more direct route with Pharaoh. In verse 15, he speaks of the
Lord and says, for now I will stretch out my hand that I might
smite thee. You're going to be smitten, Pharaoh,
and thy people with pestilence, and thou shalt be cut off from
the earth." This is an amazing speech from a man who, to begin
with, said, I can't talk. I'm not a spokesman. Send Aaron
with me. Who am I? Who am I? Get somebody
else. And yet now he stands by the
very power of God, and he's full of courage, he's brave, he has
the message of God, and he says, I'm going to stretch out my hand,
and I'm going to smite you. I'm going to smite you, and I'm
going to smite your people with pestilence, and you will be cut
off from all of the earth. This is a man who stands in the
presence of Pharaoh in the very power of God. And he is not in
fear of this man. I would remind you that Pharaoh
has the power of life and death in his hands. I mean, he could
have killed Moses except for the fact that God purposed that
Moses is not going to die now. Moses is not going to die for
another 40 years. He's going to lead the children
of Israel right up to the verge of entering into the land of
promise. But he stands before the most
powerful man in all of the earth without fear, without hesitation
of speaking the Word of God. As I said, to the natural eye,
it would appear that the mission of Moses and Aaron has been futile. in vain. But you see, God's servants
are not sent on a fool's mission. God's servants are not sent forth
with the Word of the Lord to deliver the Word in vain. That
which God has purposed to happen will happen because He's God
and it's His Word that goes forth, the very sword of the Spirit. And therefore, his word will
always be successful. And you turn to 2 Corinthians
2, at your leisure, read the whole chapter. That's what Paul
said. Paul said, our labor's not in
vain. Why, he said, we triumph in those that believe, and we
triumph in those that don't believe. We're on a mission to set forth
the Word of God, and the Word of God and the purpose of God
will be fulfilled in you, in you, in me, and in all people
who hear His Word. It shall not come across void. The Word of God is always successful. If you believe, that's due to
the triumph of the Spirit of God using the Word of the Lord.
If you believe Christ Jesus, you rest in Him. You see that
salvation is only in the sovereign Savior, in believing Him who
is the very Christ of God, who put away the sins of His people
by the shedding of His blood to His death. If you believe,
that's of God. And if you don't believe, it's
because it's not God's will, at least not at this time, for
you to believe. Because He controls all things,
belief and unbelief. If you bow the knee, that's due
to the grace of God, to the mercy of God. If you refuse to bow
the knee, if like Pharaoh, your heart is hardened, that glorifies
God too. And that'll fulfill his purpose. The scripture says up here concerning
this man in verse 12, The Lord hardened his heart.
What does that mean? How does God harden a man's heart? How did God harden Pharaoh's
heart? Well, two ways. Two ways. He withheld from this man the
power and grace of the Holy Spirit. He doesn't have to send his Holy
Spirit to you. While others around you may be
blessed and the word comes with authority, the word comes in
power, it comes in life-giving force to you, it may go to another
person and it's just like water off a duck's back. It has no
effect upon them at all. Who makes the difference in who
believes the gospel and who doesn't? It isn't the sinner. And it isn't the saint. It's
the sovereign God. If you believe to God be the
glory. If you don't believe, He withheld
His Holy Spirit from you. You see, He doesn't have to send
His Spirit to anybody. He is under no obligation, God
is under no obligation to save any son or daughter of Adam except
that obligation He put Himself under in the covenant of grace.
But as far as that which we are owed, we're owed death and judgment
and hell. That's what we're owed by nature. And if that is not our lot, if
we will never experience those things, the death of the soul,
and the punishment of God, the wrath of the Lord, if we never
experience those things, to God be the glory. He had ordained
to save us before the world began. He redeemed us by the blood of
His Son and His Spirit comes in life giving power through
the Word of the Lord and gives us life. But if He doesn't do that, if
He just withholds His Spirit from you, from me, two things
are true. your heart's not gonna get softer. And the second thing, it's only
gonna get harder. Because the same sunshine that
melts the ice hardens the clay. That's the Lord's doing. And
then how does God harden a man's heart? So he just, what the Lord
did, he just withheld the spirit of grace from Pharaoh. Well he
didn't owe it to Ferry, he didn't owe it to you. Why are you different? Why were
you made to hear his voice when others wouldn't hear his voice
at all? Why in your family were you were
you kind of arrested by the Spirit of God, and you listened to the
Word of God, and you said, that's the truth. I see it in the Word
of God. This is the Savior I must have. This is the salvation for me. It's just what I need for a helpless,
doomed, damned sinner. This is what I need. Why did
the Word come to you like that, but it didn't come to maybe your
brother, your sister, somebody else in your family? It didn't
come to them the same way, and they said, well, it was all right.
He preached too long. I don't know why they have services
often over there. Who makes a difference? That's
what Paul asked in 1 Corinthians 4. Who maketh thee to differ
from another? God hardened Pharaoh's heart.
He just withheld his spirit from him. In other words, he just
left him to himself. That's all that's gotta happen.
Lord, just leave you to yourself. Leave you to your vain thoughts,
to your natural inclination of salvation by works. The more
I do for God, the more God'll do for me. That's the way the
natural man thinks. If the Lord just leaves you to
that kind of thinking, your heart's gonna get harder and harder.
And then the second thing is, how does God harden people's
hearts? By arranging things so that those
providential happenings in your life, they don't soften you,
they harden you, you get aggravated toward God, and you get angry
toward God. Look over with me in Isaiah 6.
Let me show you something. Isaiah chapter 6. Look at verse nine, Isaiah six
and verse nine. This is the Lord speaking to
Isaiah. Isaiah chapter six and verse
nine. The Lord said to him, go and
tell this people, hear ye indeed, but understand not. And see ye
indeed, but perceive not. And he says, make the heart of
this people fat, and make their ears heavy, and shut their eyes, lest they see with their eyes,
and hear with their ears, and understand with their hearts,
and convert and be healed. In other words, preach to them,
And you see, preaching can be a blessed thing if God makes
it to be so. The preaching of the holiness
of God, and of course in the context, Isaiah, he's heard the
seraphim singing or shouting, Holy, holy, holy is the Lord
God Almighty. He sees something of the glory
of God. And now he says, the Lord says,
you go preach to these people, but as you preach to them, the
message that is a blessing to you is not gonna be a blessing
to them. It's gonna make their hearts
harder. It will make them angry with
God. You see, here's the problem with
the natural man. The natural man really hates
God. There's enmity in his heart toward
the Lord, and when he hears more of who God is, in His sovereign
authority and in His power, and that God saves whom He will,
and that He only saves by grace, no works involved a man. And
that he only says through the doing and the dying of the Lord
Jesus Christ, that same gospel that you love hardens the heart
of the rebel. He said, I don't believe that. And it makes his heart harder. And we need to understand that
only God can soften the heart. And he's not obliged to do it.
And if your heart is soft toward the things of Christ, if your
heart is soft toward the gospel of God's amazing free grace,
if your heart is receptive to the way that God does indeed
save those that are lost, it's due to the grace of God given
to you in Christ Jesus. It's due to the work of the Holy
Spirit. You see, our God, and this is
contrary to the thinking of most people, he doesn't deal with
everybody just alike. He deals with some people in
wonderful, marvelous grace. And with other people, he has
no interest in them. He has no love for them. He has
no mercy for them. He has no saving grace for them.
And he leaves them in their sin. It doesn't send to them the Holy
Spirit. Oh, they may hear a preacher
preach the true gospel, but it will not soften them. It only
hardens them. And if you love this message
of grace, thank God for it. Attribute that to the Lord only. Well, the Lord has a twofold
determination in dealing here with Pharaoh in this matter.
And the twofold determination of God is, number one, the salvation
of his people. That is the deliverance of his
people. And to show both Israel and the Egyptians just how much
God hates sin. And that all falls under the
purpose of God. Because all things fulfill his
will. Let me give you three things
here as time allows. Let me show you that God is going
to fulfill his purpose in all things. And this is verse 16.
Here's what the Lord's message is to Pharaoh. And in very deed
for this cause, and you see the word cause is italicized, but
it's reasonable for this purpose, for this reason, have I raised
thee up. Who raised up Pharaoh? Well,
you say his mom and dad did. Well, he's born in that family
because God appointed him to be born in that family. But God
raised him up. Who put him on the throne? Who
gifted him? Who gifted him with abilities
to reign and exercise judgment and gave him authority and power? Who put him on the throne? God did. God raised him up. And he did it not so that Pharaoh
could gloat, but rather he did it to show in Pharaoh, God said,
my power. You are where you are, not because
of who you are, but because of who I am, God says. And because
I'm doing with you that which I please, I've raised you up. If you look in the middle column,
if your Bible has a middle column, if you don't, maybe you could
afford to buy you one that does. But it says here, raise thee
up, that is, made thee to stand. Your Bible have it? Y'all see
that? Made thee to stand. Who made Pharaoh to stand? Who
has maintained him all of these years? Who has made Him to stand
to weather all the obstacles that He faced? Perhaps sometimes
in His kingdom somebody tried to overthrow Him, but God made
Him to stand. In every attempt to perhaps assassinate
Him and get rid of Him, God said, no, that's not going to happen.
I am making this man to stand in order to fulfill my purpose
through this man. And in that sense, nobody could
touch him. Nobody could lay a hand on him.
He stands by the power of God, an ungodly man, an evil man,
a man who hates the Lord with all of his heart, mind, soul,
and strength. A man who hates the Lord's people,
and yet the very God he despises is holding him up. He stands
by the power of God. And actually, that's the way
it is with all rulers. Doesn't matter who it is. They
stand according to the purpose of God, because you see, God's
absolute purpose will be fulfilled in everybody. It's you and me, the President,
the Vice President, Senators, House of Representatives, come
all the way down to your local PTA or whatever it's called these
days, those officials, and the City Council, all of these, they
stand by the power of God till God gets finished using them. And I know this world doesn't
believe that. But that's what the Word of God teaches. God
says, I raise you up. I raise you up. This is the purpose
of God. The determination of God, you
see, was for Joseph to wind up in Egypt, and then for Israel
to wind up in Egypt. Jacob, he goes in the land of
Goshem. And he said, well, it's because
Pharaoh said it was all right. This is the way God ordained
it. You see, Pharaoh is just a little pawn in the hands of
God. And he's moving him around according
to his will. The Pharaoh that elevated Joseph
to a high position, he died off, another one came, he died off,
another one came, he died off. And then God said, now I'm gonna
put a different man up there. But he's not gonna be kindly,
he's not gonna deal kindly with Israel. But he's a man I choose to sit
on the throne. That's the reason we should never
fuss, quarrel with the purpose of God in who has the authority
over us. We all believe it's of God, I
don't know why we fuss about it. You see, God isn't interested
in the United States of America. He's interested in His chosen
people scattered throughout the world. And He's fulfilling His
purpose in all things so that His chosen people hear of the
redemption that is in Christ Jesus and the forgiveness of
sins through His blood. That's the people God's interested
in. And all the rest of them are just figures that God uses. The businessmen, they're just
businessmen that God uses to provide employment for His people.
That's right, that's the way it is. The farmers that God uses
is to provide food for His people, that truth. The wicked, the wicked
enjoy the food as well, but that's just a, a sad mercy that they
get, but it's really for the children of God. You see, we read in the book
of 1 Corinthians, all things are yours, and you're Christ's,
and Christ is God's. You have all things in him. Stop
worrying, stop being anxious. Look to the Lord who provides
all things. And as he maintained the standing
of Pharaoh, he maintained your standing. Righteous before him,
perfect before him. And you will never lose that
standing that you have before God in Christ Jesus. The purpose
of God's going to be fulfilled. God made this man to stand. Behold
the absolute authority of the Lord over all things good and
all things evil also. Over all of Israel and over all
of the Egyptians. Over all of those who are saved
by his free grace and over all those that he's pleased to harden. Well, that's the purpose of God. He's gonna glorify himself, and
he's gonna save his people, he's gonna punish the wicked. And then notice, he says this,
he talks about the power of God, the Lord's power. In very deed,
for this cause have I raised thee up, for to show or manifest
in thee my power. And people looked at Pharaoh
and said, he's a powerful man. You got it wrong. He's standing
by the power of Almighty God. This is a revelation of the power
of God. There's a weak peon of a man
sitting upon the throne of Egypt. Who put him there? God put him
there. How does he stay there? God keeps
him there. Why is he there? He's there to
show forth the power of God. You see, God, he has his hands
in everything. That's just kind of a simple
way to put it, but I mean, everything, he's involved in everything.
He just didn't create creation and then say, well, go on, do
what you want to do, all of you. Oh, no, no. He who made all things
is the mastermind behind directing all things to the end that He
Himself has ordained. That's our God. I wouldn't give
you five cents for the God preached from most pulpits today. That
God can't be feared. He can't do what he wants to
do. He's held in check by the wills of men. Ah, but when I
hear about our God, who rules in the armies of heaven and among
the inhabitants of the earth, and those who are filled with
pride, he's able to abase, just ask Nebuchadnezzar. Ask him about
that. He'll tell you, I'll tell you
what, the Lord made me eat grass like oxen, and my hair grew like
bird's feathers, and my fingernails like eagle's claws. And I was
in bad shape, I lost my understanding, and then God gave me my understanding,
and now I see who God is. That's the problem, you see,
the natural man doesn't see who God is. And he never will. unless God opens his eyes. Then
you'll see who you're dealing with. Then you'll say, oh God,
show me mercy for Christ's sake. Oh, the power of God. His power
is seen in maintaining Israel. His power is seen in the pouring
out of these plagues. And you know, throughout all
these plagues, you know, not one of them killed Pharaoh. A
lot of his people died. But he didn't. Why didn't he
die? God wasn't finished with him.
He will, he will die, and God will get judgment. Because God has a final word
on everybody. But it's not his time yet. Not
his time. Well, there's the purpose of
God, the power of God, and here's the last thing. The Lord has
arranged things for the proclamation of his glorious name. He said
that my name might be declared throughout all the earth. And
here we are. Thousands of years later, and
whose name are we bragging on? The Lord God of glory. And people who have any concept,
any idea of the word of God at all, know what happened to Pharaoh
and the Egyptians. And people still talk about it.
what God did. You know, when the Israelites
got into the land of promise, Rahab, she said there in Jericho,
she said, we've heard, we've heard what your God's done. They're
talking about the power of God. And throughout all of history,
people have talked about what God did to Pharaoh, what God
did to the Egyptians. And I got news for all of them.
He's the same God today. He has the same authority today.
And as he did back then, so he does now. Some hearts he softens,
some hearts he hardens. See, God made a name for himself
in the deliverance of Israel. You know, they were already in
the land of Canaan Famine came, right? Jacob was already laying
in Canaan. So wonder why the Lord didn't
just leave him there. Why take him into Egypt? Oh,
the ways of God are mysterious, aren't they? We'd like for it
to be shortcuts. It's just, surely they won't
have to go through all those hardships. They're already in
the land of promise. Well, it's not the right time. Not the right time. About 440
more years, there will be a generation who will be ready to go in. All things happen according to
God's timetable. And what he was doing, is making
a name for himself. That's what God's doing, making
a name for him, give glory to his name. The hymn writer said, dearest
of all the names above, my Jesus and my God, who can resist thy
heavenly love? or trifle with thy blood. Tis
by the merits of thy death the Father smiles again. Tis by thine
interceding breath the Spirit dwells with men. To God and human
flesh I see my thoughts no comfort find. The holy, just, and sacred
three are terrors to my mind. But if Emmanuel's face appear,
my hope, my joy, begins, his name forbids my slavish fear,
his grace removes my sins. While on God's law the Jews rely
and Greeks of wisdom both. I love the incarnate mystery
and there I fix my trust. You see, God's made a name for
himself by saving sinners. He made a name for himself when
he knocked Saul off his horse of pride, didn't he? And he made
a name for himself when he knocked you off your horse of pride,
too. Brought you out of paganism,
pagan religion, free will religion, a religion that's centered around
self. He did that. You didn't do that
for yourself. Well, what's God doing? He's
making a name for Himself. And therefore we say, to God
be the glory. Great things He hath done. We're
not bragging on our names. Our names are nothing. But the
name of our Lord is great and glorious. Let's sing a closing
song.