There are many things there in
Exodus chapter 10 that we won't have time to look at tonight.
And really, I want to begin in chapter 9. Look at Exodus 9 and
verse 29. We'll just read that verse. And
then keep in mind chapter 10 also tonight as we see a few
things, if the Lord is pleased to teach us. I pray that He will.
Exodus 9 29 and Moses said unto him as soon as I am gone out
of the city I will spread abroad my hands unto the Lord and the
thunder shall cease Neither shall there be any more hail That thou
mayest know how that the earth is the Lord's In chapter 9 before
we talked about true confession of sin and how that Pharaoh's
confession though he said, I have sinned, had all the marks of
a false confession of sin. We didn't consider the plague
itself there. So tonight we'll look at that
plague in conjunction also with the two that were sent by God
in chapter 10. And let's consider this for a
moment. We're told the significance of
the storm and the hail in verse 29. Um, And this reaffirms what we've
seen all along, that God, with each of these plagues, is causing
something to be known. In addition to, and more specific
than just the general truth, that there are consequences for
disobeying God. That God is sovereign, what he
commands is to be obeyed. And that man is rebellious and
refuses God by nature. Nobody had to provoke Pharaoh
to do that. The command of God was clear,
and Pharaoh's natural reaction to it was to rebel. Who is this
God to tell me what to do? I'm sitting on the throne, and
I'll do what I please. And this, as I said, it reaffirms
that all of these plagues, in all of them, God is causing something
to be known. Here he said, I'll have you know
something. I'll have you know something.
And we've seen that in every case. The blood clearly showed
that the wages of sin is death. There's no remission of sin without
blood because that's God's requirement. Death is the just consequence
for our sin. And the blood clearly pictured
that. The various pests and the parasites, the frogs and the
lice and the flies, they pictured those who rebel against God.
Because we saw all through the scripture how those things revealed
those same truths, how that all sinners by nature, both satanic,
as the frogs represented those evil spirits that came out of
the mouths of Satan and his prophets, and also human. The flies, the
maggots, the lice, the parasites, the disease and the boils. When
God sent that disease upon the cattle and that plague of boils upon all the
people. That did two things. Not only
were the Egyptians afflicted in their bodies, they felt the
misery of their sin. They were miserable and vile,
vile to themselves and vile to one another. But not only that,
all of their prosperity, their livestock vanished before their
very eyes. Imagine when All that you have
in this world is gain, that earthly gain. And when the stock market
crashed, I couldn't even tell you when it was. Was it in the
20s or the great crash of the market? People jumped out of
buildings and killed themselves, because that's all they had.
That was everything to them. That's what happened to the Egyptians
here. They sat there and looked out their windows. as their house
was pummeled and damaged and everything they had was destroyed.
All of their livestock were killed and all of their plants. The
plague killed the livestock and all of the produce was destroyed
by the hail. And what the hail didn't get
or what began to grow up after the hail was gone, he sent these
locusts to devour it. And so the same Despair was in
the hearts of these Egyptians as is in so many who lose all
of their earthly gain and Now in this chapter 29 of Chapter
9 verse 29 we're told that God sent this hail and this declaring
something very specific He's shown in all of the plagues,
these various things, but particularly here in this one, and really
in these three, that God has this particular message that
he not only is revealing here, but says, this is what I want
you to know as a result of this, the hail. It shows God's sovereignty
over the elements. God controls the elements. Well, everybody knows that. tsunami, earthquake, flood, volcano,
tornado, hurricane, lightning, fire, blizzards, droughts, and
all such things. Oh, God wouldn't do that. He
has done that. He still does that and He will
do that. He promised that He would. And we know that the earth
is the Lord's by this thing. God has a message for you and
me and all mankind in all of these things, like the hail and
everything like that. The earth is mine. It's mine. It's not Mother Nature's. It's
not yours. It's mine, God said. That's the
message. Did we get that? That just seems
so basic, doesn't it? I wish everybody knew that, don't
you? That's why the plowing of the wicked is sin. Well, plowing
seems like a wholesome thing. It's sin because when they do
it, when an evil man who knows not God does that, he's saying
the earth is mine. No, God said it's mine. And you'll
plow it if you plow it, honoring him in it and thanking him for
what it produces or it's sin. We take from God's earth and
then blaspheme the name of the God whose earth sustains us. And so God makes that very earth
rise up in judgment against us with these natural disasters,
so-called. All of these things are at his
sovereign command and are sent at his sovereign discretion.
His sovereign control of the elements is used to picture his
sovereignty in spiritual things. He's the God physically of all
the elements, but also these things picture spiritual things,
all through the scripture, just to name a few. Didn't our Lord
say to Nicodemus that the Holy Spirit moves like the wind? Well,
what do you mean by that? He goes wherever he pleases.
And you can hear the sound, you can see the effects of what the
Holy Spirit does, but you can't make him go anywhere that you
want him to go. You don't know where he came
from and you don't know where he'll go next. He goes where
he pleases. So in the elements we see the
spiritual truth of God. Didn't he in Isaiah 55 compare
his word to the rain that falls to the earth and accomplishes
exactly what he sends it in order to accomplish? Didn't he compare
in Amos 8 11? He said, I'll send a famine in
those days, not a famine of water, but a famine of hearing the word
of the Lord. He compares spiritual things
and teaches spiritual things in this as he has with all of
these plagues. The earth is the Lord's, and
so are you, and so am I. Our souls are his. He made us
from the dust of the earth. He's the potter that has power
over the clay. To make one lump unto honor,
and one vessel unto honor from the same love that he makes a
vessel unto dishonor from. And then the locusts in chapter
10 show that God is sovereign not over the elements only, but
all of the creatures of the earth. Everything, the insects, the
animals, the birds. He sent his raven unto his prophet,
didn't he, with food in its mouth. to sustain his profit. He was
able to shut the mouths of the lions. How did he do that? They're
his lions. They do what he says they do.
He sent his whale to swallow up Jonah and to bring him back
to where he was supposed to be. And all of these also picture
God's sovereignty in spiritual things. He sustains us, he feeds
us, he gives us life like the rain gives life to the tender
herb. And He keeps us by His power. And the darkness, imagine complete
darkness falling upon this land in a blink. God just simply turned
His Son off. He turned off the light. And
this shows, just like Genesis chapter 1, the role that means
play in God's hand. The Son is a means that God uses
in order to give warmth to the earth in order to give light
to the earth and he can turn it off whenever he gets good
and ready and turn it back on at his discretion in genesis
chapter 1 3 though god said let there be light and there was
light and then later in that same chapter in verse 14 after
he had divided the waters and caused the grass and the herbs
to spring up after he had done some other things he said i'm
gonna put the sun in the sky now and the moon. Well, how was there light before
that, that there was a sun? Well, here's the thing about
that. God uses means, but he doesn't need them. He doesn't
need a sun in order to have light. He's light. He is the light.
And here in Exodus, he didn't destroy the sun when he made
it dark. He was going to use the sun later.
Could have done that if he wanted to. Just destroy the sun and
then when he got good and ready, make another one. He made that
one. But it doesn't seem like that's what he does. He just
turned the light off, just like we'll turn the bedroom light
off tonight when we get ready to go to sleep. He made the sun
stop in the sky once for a time. Why did he do it? To bless his
people. To give victory to his people. That's why he does everything
he does. for his own glory and for our
eternal good. He also gives and withholds spiritual
light as it seems good unto him to do so. So these three plagues,
particularly these three, show that the earth is the Lord's
in the sense that he is the creator of all and has authority to give
and to take away all of the things in his earth, but also that he
is the potter who hath power over the clay, spiritually speaking,
of the same lump to make one vessel into honor and another
into dishonor. The earth is the Lord's. 2 Corinthians 4, 6, turn there
with me. I want you to look at a few scriptures
tonight, and I'll be fairly brief, I think, tonight. 2 Corinthians
4, 6, you're very familiar with this 1st 2nd Corinthians 4 6 God caused great darkness. Let's
talk about that plague for a little while and the spiritual teaching
of that for God who commanded the light to shine out of darkness. We just referred to that Genesis
chapter one. He caused the light to shine
out of darkness. Before he ever made the sun,
he said, let there be light. And there was. And that God,
that God, Paul said, has shined in my heart. He did the same
thing, only not physical light, but spiritual light. There's light you can see with these
eyes, and then there's heart light. There's light that shines
in the soul. And he said here that the same
God that said, let there be light. And there was light in this earth.
He said, let there be light. And there was light in my heart.
The same sovereign God with the same sovereign power at the same
sovereign discretion sent light where there was darkness. The
light shined out of darkness. Why did he do that? To give the
light of the knowledge of the glory of God. To make something known. Moses
said that you might know that God is God and the earth belongs
to him. It's not yours. That throne's
not yours. All those cattle are not yours.
These people aren't yours. This nation, this country is
not yours. It's God's. And you'll bow or you'll be destroyed. Here's the spiritual truth of
that. God's making known his glory by shedding abroad his
light in the hearts of sinners. Where is that light? Where is
that glory? It's in the face of his son.
It's the Lord Jesus Christ. He is the glory of God and he
is the light. He said, I am the light of the
world. Jeremiah 13, 15. Listen to this. Hear ye and give ear, be not
proud for the Lord hath spoken. It sounded like he could be talking
to Pharaoh there. Don't, don't be proud. It's God
speaking to you. Give glory to the Lord your God
before he caused darkness, lest he cause darkness and before
your feet stumble upon the dark mountains and while you look
for light and he turn it into the shadow of death and make
it gross darkness. God will make darkness to fall
upon you. if you're proud and you rebel
against him this is spiritual language now this is not physical
light he's talking and physical darkness he's talking about there
in jeremiah 13 15 and 16 that's spiritual darkness and that comes
at his discretion just as the light does god will make it darkness
romans 1 21 because with that when they knew god they glorified
him not as god That was Pharaoh's sin. That was Adam's sin. That's
your sin. That's my sin. God has clearly given some light.
There's a light that lighteth every man that cometh into the
world, isn't there? There's the light of conscience. There's
the light of creation. There's the light of God's written
word. But we glorify him not as God. It's not that we don't
understand things about God and don't know anything about God.
You can talk about that all they want to. God can't be known,
oh yeah. You can't hate somebody you don't
know. There's no spiritual knowledge of God without his grace. But when they knew God, they
glorified him not as God. Neither were thankful. Is that
what Pharaoh's problem was too? God said, this earth that you
think you own so much of and are over so much of, that's my
earth. He hadn't thanked God for any
of that, those cattle or those herbs or those, that produce. And so God took it from him. They weren't thankful and became
vain in their imagination. Worshiping frogs and rivers and
worshiping the creature rather than the creator. And their foolish heart was darkened. The Lord Jesus Christ,
thank God for the light. He said, I am the light of the
world. He that followeth me shall not walk in darkness, but shall have the light of life. God is showing Pharaoh that rebellion
against God is darkness. As the physical darkness fell
upon Egypt, his spiritual darkness falls upon the heart because
of rebellion like Pharaoh's and like Adam's and like mine and
yours. But he has shown his people the
light in the face of Jesus, the light of his glory. in the face
of his son. Thank God for that light, for
revelation. Saul of Tarsus once defied the
Lord Jesus Christ much like Pharaoh. He opposed the Lord Jesus and
his people just like Pharaoh did, but Saul was confronted
by the Lord Jesus Christ on the road to Damascus. And do you
remember what happened there? Saul gave an account of it later.
Acts chapter 26 Turn there with me. Let's look
at this together Acts chapter 26 in verse 12 Paul is speaking
to King Agrippa And explaining why he had been doing what he'd
been doing preaching the gospel And he said in verse 12 whereupon
as I went to Damascus with authority and commission from the chief
priests I At midday, O King, I saw in the way a light, a light from heaven. That's where
light comes from, from heaven. Above the brightness of the sun
shining round about me and them which journeyed with me. And
when we were all fallen to the earth, I heard a voice speaking
unto me and saying in the Hebrew tongue, Saul, Saul, why persecutest
thou me? It is hard for me for thee to
kick against the pricks. And I said, Who art thou, Lord? And he said, I am Jesus, whom
thou persecutest. But rise and stand upon thy feet,
for I have appeared unto thee for this purpose, to make thee
a minister and a witness both of these things which thou hast
seen. and of those things in the which I will appear unto
thee, delivering thee from the people and from the Gentiles
unto whom now I send thee, to open their eyes and to turn them
from darkness to light, and from the power of Satan unto God. You see here with that light
and with that darkness pictured in Egypt, it's the power of Satan. Pharaoh, it's satanic to rebel
against God. That's what Satan did. That's
what he whispered in Eve's ear in the garden. Rebellion against
God's clear, revealed authority and will. Lord, but there's a
message that God sends to a people to turn them from the power of
Satan unto God, from darkness unto light, that they may receive
forgiveness of sins and inheritance among them which are sanctified
by faith that is in me. And having seen the Lord Jesus,
having seen that light, that great light, Saul went from rebellion
and hatred to, Lord, what would you have me to do? If Pharaoh, from the very start,
where our brother read tonight, the Lord said to him, how long
will you rebel? How long will you not obey my
voice? If Pharaoh had said from the start, Lord, what would you
have me do? No sinner's going to say that,
are they? Not until they meet the Lord Jesus Christ. Not until
Christ comes where they are like he did Saul of Tarsus. Knocked
him off his high horse and put him in the dust. Revealed the
light to him, revealed himself to him. And he saw the glory
of God in the face of his son. Look what Pharaoh's servants
said to him in chapter 10, verse 7, back in our text in Exodus
10, 7. We'll look at a lot more of the
text in chapter 10 next time, Lord willing, but I wanted you
to hear the language concerning those plagues there. Verse 7
of chapter 10, and Pharaoh's servants said unto him, how long
shall this man be a snare unto us? Let the men go. Enough already
that they may serve the Lord their God. Knowest thou not yet
that Egypt is destroyed? I'm sure they didn't talk to
Pharaoh that way every day. This is desperation. Pharaoh,
don't you see what's happening here? The whole land, Egypt is
a wasteland. Can you imagine what a wasteland
it was? God took each plague away after
a time, but there were still dead frogs everywhere when that
plague was over. All the livestock and produce,
they didn't magically reappear after the hail and the pestilence.
Those things were gone. They had to start all over. All
of their homes and buildings, no doubt, were destroyed by the
hail and the lightning and the storm. They said, Egypt is destroyed. What are you doing? And this
will be the ultimate result of sin. As Egypt pictures this world,
what's God going to do with this world because of sin? Ultimately,
it'd be burned up with a fervent heat, Peter said. with a fervent
heat that the earth will melt and God will make a new one wherein
dwelleth righteousness. God's people shall be delivered
and the earth destroyed because of sin. Now let's take one last
look at these plagues, all the plagues together. This will be
very brief and what God reveals to his people in them. Now we've
kind of focused on the Egyptians and the judgment and the And
we've talked about the Israelite psalm, how that God made a difference
between the Egyptians and them. But this is all about God's people.
What did the plagues mean? What does God reveal to a sinner
when he reveals the plague of sin to our hearts? Whenever God
saves one of his people, he reveals to us the wages of our sin, blood,
death, He reveals that, doesn't he? He reveals what we deserve
before him. He reveals to us also what we
are. We're parasites, we're disgusting,
we're revolting, repulsive parasites in his world. We're maggots,
grown-up maggots, flying around, spreading disease and constantly
consuming and never giving any benefit, never doing anything
productive. He also reveals to us the misery
and destruction brought about by our sin, shown by these plagues
of pestilence and hail and boils. He causes all that seems valuable
to us to be destroyed before our very eyes. And this is grace. This is mercy. These plagues,
When the Lord brings the plague of our sin down upon us so that
we understand what we deserve and what we are and who we are
and what our sin and misery really is, the spiritual nature of our
condition before him, that's mercy from God. When he causes
everything that's valuable to us to be destroyed before our
very eyes, that's mercy. Paul said, I've suffered the
loss of all things and I'm thanking God for it now. He reveals his
sovereignty to me. This is all mine. It's not yours,
Pharaoh. You're in my hand and I'll do
with you as I please. Did he reveal that to you when
he saved you? Were you hanging up on his mercy then? Me too. He put me in the dust at his
feet. That's where he saves sinners.
He raises us from the dunghill and sets us among princes. You
don't have to spend some time on the dunghill. He crushes our
pride and rebellion, shows us the darkness of our own souls. Did you notice the language there
in chapter 10, verses 21 and 22? It said, this is thick darkness. It's darkness that may be felt.
Can you imagine that? And it raises the question, have
you ever felt the darkness of your own heart? God will cause
you to feel it if he's going to turn on the light. Turn to
Lamentations 3. We're almost through. I just
want you to see this. I referred to this passage of scripture, just a
verse or two of it in a message, and then I've been wanting to
preach on it ever since. And then Jimmy read, even more
of it a little while after that is such a blessing I just want
to look at this just briefly just read it really listen to
this is what God does now when he saves a sinner Jeremiah says
I am the man chapter 3 verse 1 that hath seen affliction by
the rod of his wrath he hath led me and brought me into darkness
but not into light have you ever been there? Surely against me
is he turned. We see that God's wrath abides
upon us as sinners in our natural condition before him. He turneth
his hand against me all the day. My flesh and my skin hath he
made old. He causes me to see the change
and decay. What's the result of sin? We
die in every day. He hath broken my bones. He hath
builded against me, encompassed me with gall and travail. This is spiritual language now.
He hath set me in dark places. He got to put you there before
he sheds his light upon you. And He does do that. He knows
how to bring in the darkness, doesn't He? He knows how to cause
a thick darkness that may be felt to come upon sinners. As they that be dead of old.
He hath hedged me about that I cannot get out. Aren't you
thankful? Aren't you thankful? He shut
you up. He hath made my chain heavy.
And when I cry and shout, he shutteth out my prayer. He hath
enclosed my ways with hue and stone. He hath made my paths
crooked. Oh boy, I thought they were straight
before, until the Lord revealed to me what I am. They were crooked all along,
I just didn't know it. He was unto me as a bear lying
in wait and as a lion in secret places. He hath turned aside
my ways and pulled me in pieces. Has he ever done that to you?
He hath made me desolate. He hath bent his bow and set
me as a mark for the arrow. He hath caused the arrows of
his quiver to enter into my reins. I was a derision to all my people
and their song all the day. He hath filled me with bitterness.
He hath made me drunken with wormwood. He hath also broken
my teeth with gravel stones. He hath covered me with ashes.
Now has removed my soul far off from peace. I forget prosperity. And I said, my strength and my
hope is perished from the Lord. Remembering mine affliction and
my misery, the wormwood and the gall, my soul hath them still
in remembrance and is humbled in me. This I recall to my mind, therefore
have I hope. It is of the Lord's mercies that
we are not consumed. This is what we deserve. We see the wrath We see the darkness. We see what we are. And we realize
that what the Lord ought to do is put us in hell. But He's merciful. He hadn't consumed me. He hadn't
cast me off. I have hope. Because His compassions,
they fail not. They are new every morning. Great
is Thy faithfulness. The Lord is my portion, saith
my soul, therefore will I hope in him. The Lord is good unto
them that wait for him, to the soul that seeketh him. It is
good that a man should both hope and quietly wait for the salvation
of the Lord. Has he ever brought you through
that? Through varying experiences to different degrees, every sinner
has felt the darkness. Felt it. Felt it. And then seen
the light of God's glory in the face of the Lord Jesus Christ. He reveals to us the Lamb. And this is seen in our text
in Exodus, isn't it? First, the Lord caused darkness
to fall in chapter 10. And then the very next thing
he did, the next plague is what? The lamb, the Passover. First darkness, and then the
lamb, because the lamb is the light. Revelation 21, 23, and
the city had no need of the sun, neither of the moon, to shine in it, for the glory
of God did lighten it, and the Lamb is the light thereof."
That's not two different lights. That's two descriptions of the
same light. The glory of God did lighten
it, and the Lamb is the light thereof. And as I stand before you tonight, I've seen the darkness of you.
God caused the darkness to be felt in my heart. But as I stand
before you tonight, if there is in this dark, wicked heart
of mine any light, and by God's grace there is. The lamb is the
light thereof. The lamb that was slain and raised
again for my justification. The lamb of God that takes away
sin, John said. The sacrificial lamb that took
my sin upon himself and was slain in my place. The lamb who is
in the midst of the throne of glory. There was in the midst
of the throne a lamb as it had been slain. The lamb who is himself, as we
saw there in Revelation 21-23, the very glory of God. And then next week, we'll look
at chapter 10 a little bit, and then maybe talk about chapter
11, the 10th and final plague. I like what my brother read the
last verse there. Pharaoh told Moses, he said,
I want you out of my sight, and I don't ever want to see you
again. And Moses said, that's exactly what I want. Isn't that
what he said? Thou hast spoken well. Thou shalt
see my face no more. And that's wonderful because
you see, Pharaoh is me. Without God and without Christ
and without hope in this world. And Moses is me in Christ. And Moses don't want to see Pharaoh
anymore, does he? I don't want to see him anymore.
Thou hast said well. Let's bow in prayer.