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Heavenly Father, we're so grateful for this opportunity to be in your Word. Lord, we're thankful that the men had a good time at the retreat and that they were fed the Word of God. We're thankful for all the men preaching the Word of God, Lord, all throughout this state and throughout this land and indeed throughout all the world.
So we ask a special blessing on all the other churches that are assembling this evening. We ask it in Jesus' name, amen.
Amen.
Exodus 10.
Now the Lord said to Moses, go into Pharaoh, for I have hardened his heart and the hearts of his servants, that I may show these signs of mine before him, and that you may tell in the hearing of your son and your son's son, the mighty things I have done in Egypt and my signs which I have done among them, that you may know that I am the Lord.
So Moses and Aaron came into Pharaoh and said to him, Thus says the Lord God of the Hebrews,.
How long will you refuse to humble yourself before me? Let my people go, that they may serve me, or else if you refuse to let my people go, behold, tomorrow I will bring locusts to your territory, and they shall cover the face of the earth, so that no one will be able to see the earth, and they shall eat the residue of what is left, which remains to you from the hail, and they shall eat every tree which grows up for you out of the field.
They shall fill your houses, the houses of all your servants, and the houses of all the Egyptians, which neither your fathers nor your father's fathers have seen since the day that they were on the earth.
Do this then.
And he turned and went out from Pharaoh. Then Pharaoh's servants said to him, How long shall this man be a snare to us? Let the men go, that they may serve the Lord their God. Do you not yet know that Egypt is destroyed?
So Moses and Aaron were brought again to Pharaoh.
Go, serve the Lord your God. Who are the ones that are going?
We will go with our young and our old, with our sons and our daughters, with our flocks and our herds. We will go, for we must hold a feast to the Lord.
The Lord had better be with you when I let you and your little ones go. Beware, for evil is ahead of you. Lasso, go now, you who are men, and serve the Lord, for that is what you desire.
And they were driven out from Pharaoh's presence.
Then the Lord said to Moses, Stretch out your hand over the land of Egypt for the locusts, that they may come upon the land of Egypt and eat every herb of the land, all that the hail has left.
So Moses stretched out his rod over the land of Egypt, and the Lord brought an east wind on the land all that day and all that night. When it was morning, the east wind brought the locusts. And the locusts went up over all the land of Egypt and wrested off all the territory of Egypt.
They were very severe. Previously there had been no such locusts of men, nor shall there be any such after them, for they covered the face of the whole earth so that the land was dark. And they ate every herb of the land and all the fruit of the trees which the hail had left.
So there remained nothing green on the trees or on the plants of the field throughout all the land of Egypt. Then Pharaoh called for Moses and Aaron in haste.
I have sinned against the Lord your God and against you, for please forgive my sin. Only this once, and entreat the Lord your God that he may take away from me this death.
So he went out from Pharaoh and entreated the Lord. And the Lord turned a very strong west wind which took the locusts away and blew them into the Red Sea. There remained not one locust in all the territory of Egypt.
But the Lord hardened Pharaoh's heart and he did not let the children of Israel go.
Then the Lord said to Moses, stretch out your hand toward heaven, that there may be darkness over the land of Egypt, darkness which may even be felt.
So Moses stretched out his hand toward heaven. And there was thick darkness in all the land of Egypt three days. They did not see one another, nor did anyone rise from his place for three days. But all the children of Israel had light in their dwellings.
Then Pharaoh called to Moses, God, serve the Lord. Amid, let your flocks and your herds be kept back. Let your little ones also go with you.
But Moses said, you must also give us sacrifices and burnt offerings, that we may sacrifice to the Lord our God. Our livestock also shall go with us. Not a hoof shall be left behind, for we must take some of them to serve the Lord our God.
And even we do not know with what we must serve the Lord until we arrive there.
But the Lord hardened Pharaoh's heart and he would not let them go. Then Pharaoh said to him, get away from me.
Take heed to yourself and see my face no more. For in the day you see my face, you shall die.
You have spoken well. I will never see your face again.
Okay, in Exodus chapter 10, we see the eighth plague of the locusts. And then the ninth plague of the darkness. And you notice that where it said that it was so dark that the darkness could be felt. I don't know exactly what that means.
But you can imagine. Maybe you can't. You just couldn't see anything. What's that? Yeah. It's kind of creepy. So these are the plagues. But before we get to the plagues, I want to highlight the importance of the Lord telling Moses that he is to pass these things down to his son and to his son's son.
Look at chapter 10, verses one and two. It says, now the Lord said to Moses, go into Pharaoh, for I have hardened his heart and the hearts of his servants, that I may show these signs of mine before him.
And that you may tell in the hearing of your son and your son's son, the mighty things I have done in Egypt and my signs, which I have done among them, that you may know that I am the Lord. I'd like to read what one commentator said about this.
Those who experience God's mercies are bound to hand them down or hand down the memory, what has been done to future generations. Natural gratitude would prompt such action. But lest the duty be neglected, the Israelites had it at this time constantly enjoined upon them.
So the Lord instructs Moses to do this, and really all of the Israelites will do this, to pass these stories down to all generations. And of course, when we get to the Passover in a couple chapters, that's going to be the pinnacle of this, of celebrating the Passover throughout all generations of Israel so that they remember what the Lord has done and that they know who the Lord is.
So since we're talking about a nation here, or what will become a nation, the nation of Israel, you think of events that we pass down from generation to generation. As an American, we kind of pass down important stories.
You think of July 4th. I mean, that's a celebration that we all are aware of. Important dates like 1776 have great significance. Or maybe you pass down a story of where you were when you found out that John F. Kennedy was assassinated, or where you were when 9 -11 happened.
There are certain things that bind us together as a people, certain things that bind us together as a nation, or at least there used to be, and that seems to be fading. What's the point? People need an identity.
A nation needs an identity. 1 Corinthians 10, where Paul says that they were baptized into Moses. So they have this identification. They were immersed into Moses as their leader. So the whole identity of the nation of Israel and the Hebrew people is really forming here.
And they pass this down to their sons and their sons' sons, et cetera. And you think of all the dramatic events that we've read about, there's going to be more. Think, why did God do it this way? He could have changed Pharaoh's heart and let my people go and, all right, go ahead and serve the Lord in the wilderness.
Why did God do it this way? Well, he did it, look at verse 2 again, that you may tell in the hearing of your son and your son's son, the mighty things I have done in Egypt.
Why?
That you may know that I am the Lord. So if it wasn't for this astonishing display of supernatural power, would God have received all the glory if he didn't do it this way? What if it was men fighting, the Hebrew men fighting with swords against Pharaoh's men?
Well, then men could take credit. And after a generation or two, just like our nation, who gets the credit? God? Maybe a little bit at times, but, you know, men like George Washington get the credit. Abraham Lincoln, he gets the credit.
Well, the Lord wants to make sure that I, the Lord God, get all the glory. So I think that's the point of why it happened the way that it did. So the plagues do not just deliver Israel, they will define Israel as God's covenant people.
And this is passed down to their children. Yes, Dennis.
Two thoughts. How many times does God say that in the Old Testament? Did you ever get a number?
Say what specifically?
When God says, so that the earth may know or that I am the Lord, that's repeated a lot.
I don't have the number. Who wants to take that on for next week and come back with it? It is a theme.
That's an amazing theme. And then the passage that crossed my mind, you're talking about God being glorified. Jesus waited before going to Lazarus.
It says it right there.
Yeah.
So God would be so he'd be glorified.
Good.
Anything else? Larry.
Verse 16 from chapter nine. But indeed, for this purpose, I have raised you up that I may show my power in you and that my name be declared in all the earth.
God is a jealous God. He will not give his glory to another. Verse three. So Moses and Aaron came into Pharaoh and said to him, thus says the Lord God of the Hebrews, how long will you refuse to humble yourselves before me or humble yourself before me?
Let my people go that they may serve me. Or else, if you refuse to let my people go, behold, tomorrow I will bring locusts into your territory. Now turn to Joel chapter one. If you would. Joel chapter one.
Yes. Marcus.
309 times.
Okay.
So you looked at it. You were ready for that. Or did you just know before?
No.
I just looked it up.
Google it.
My phone knows.
Bible gateway.
Blue letter Bible.
Blue letter Bible. That sure beats looking up every reference.
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
It could be.
That's the spirit. All right. So where is the book of Joel? What section of the scripture. Minor profits towards the end of the old Testament.
So Joel writes something interesting about judgments or a judgment of locusts that comes upon the land. And that same language that is found in Joel is also found where in the book of revelation. We've seen this connection in many chapters.
So that's revelation chapter nine. We'll touch on that in a moment where there's that great plague of, of locusts or at least things that appear to John as locusts.
Joel chapter one, verse one, and the word of the Lord that came to Joel, the son of the fuel here, this you elders and give ear all you inhabitants of the land. Has anything like this happened in your days or even in the days of your fathers?
That sounds similar, right? What we're just reading. So does this verse three, tell your children about it. Let your children tell their children and their children and other generation. What the chewing locust left, the swarming locust has eaten what the swarming locust left.
The crawling locust has eaten and what the crawling locust left, the consuming locust has eaten. So not only do we see here a plague or a judgment of the locust upon the land, we see the same kind of language that we saw in Exodus.
So there's many connections. He says, tell your children, your children's children, but here's the difference in Exodus. The plague is upon the Egyptians. Who's the plague upon now? Right now it's the Lord sending this judgment upon the children of Israel.
So along with God's name being magnified and all of the earth and Exodus, and this was to show Pharaoh and the Egyptians and eventually the whole world, you know what the Lord wanted to show his people as well, who he was and what he was capable of doing.
And that really sends a strong message to the Hebrews that God must be reverenced and feared, not just Pharaoh and the Egyptians, but God's people need to reverence him. Yes, Larry.
Okay, this is, Joel was written to the southern kingdom of Judah, which was the more godly of the two nations.
Right.
Israel, I don't know that they ever had any good kings once the nation were divided.
And Judah had more than, more good than bad, but here it's judgment on those people that were more, I guess, walking with the Lord, so to speak.
Good point. So in verse six of Joel one, the locusts are described as though they were a great army and he says that they have teeth as what? The teeth of a lion. As a lion. And then if you skip over to Joel chapter two and look at verse four, it says again of the locusts, their appearance is like the appearance of horses.
That sounds strange.
That's a good sized locust.
Appearance of horses and like swift steeds, so they run. So this is very, very similar to what we see in revelation chapter nine with the locusts that come out of the bottomless pit. Revelation nine verses seven and eight says the shape of the locusts was like horses prepared for battle on their heads were crowns of something like gold and their faces were like the faces of men and their hair were like women's hair and their teeth were like, guess what? Lions teeth.
So there's these connections of God's judgments that fall upon Egypt, then upon his own people and the Jews. And then of course it's on the whole world in the book of revelation. Also since we're in Joel two, Joel chapter two mentions the day of the Lord, right?
We're talking about this at our Thursday night Bible study for men's group a few weeks ago. What's the day of the Lord? And every person around the table had a different answer.
Jimmy D young, he had a good answer. Larry had the right answer though. He said, there's not just one day of the Lord. There was a day of the Lord in the old Testament that maybe was on a smaller scale, but then there's the great and dreadful day of the Lord, the ultimate day of the Lord, which is the tribulation period.
All right. So you can go back to Exodus 10, but clearly there's a connection between Exodus and the plagues in the book of revelation. And yes, I know I've repeated that several weeks in a row. And one of the reasons I do that is because that's how we learn.
We learn through repetition. If I only mentioned it once and someone's not paying attention, well then you missed.
It.
Or if I just mentioned it once and somebody isn't there that week or they don't watch online, then you're going to miss it. If you hear it four weeks in a row, you're probably going to remember it. So if you say, why is the pastor repeating himself?
Usually there's a reason. All right. Sometimes I might, maybe I just do it, but usually a reason. All right. So back to Exodus chapter 10, Pharaoh has hardened his heart. Now God is going to harden it.
We've seen how Pharaoh thinks that he can negotiate with the Lord. And let me just say, you, you really can't negotiate with the Lord. Abraham kind of got away with it a little bit, although it didn't really work out for him.
But Pharaoh, this isn't, this isn't going to happen. And you know, one of the points here, Pharaoh thing, okay, you can go just keep this group back, keep this group back. No, the command is let them go.
You know, a partial obedience is what?
Disobedience. Look at verse seven. At this point, Pharaoh's subjects, they've about had it. It says then Pharaoh's servants said to him, how long shall this man be a snare to us? Let the men go. Notice that let the men go that they may serve the Lord, their God.
Do you not yet know that Egypt is destroyed? So they're trying to reason with Pharaoh, you know, he's, he's got a hard heart. He's stubborn. It's like enough is enough.
Let them go. Let the men go. You know, let's strike a compromise here. Verse eight. So Moses and Aaron were brought in again to Pharaoh and he said to them, go serve the Lord, your God. And then he asked, who are the ones that are going?
So what's being proposed that the men go and serve the Lord, which would mean what? That the women and the children get left behind. Now just kind of put yourself in the shoes. You're a, you're a man and Israelite back in those days.
Would you feel real good about leaving your wife and kids and all the women and children back in the land while you leave? And the Egyptians will treat them well, I'm sure, right? No, I mean, this, this really was not an option for multiple reasons.
So I think what God is doing and he's sending the message of the importance of corporate worship, getting everybody together. And not only just everybody, you know, everybody in the family, husband, wife, children, getting everyone together.
Now, listen, don't get me wrong. There's nothing wrong with men's groups. There's nothing wrong. Sunday school is great for the kids. There's nothing wrong with women getting together and having something special for the women.
But I believe the Lord wants the whole family together for worship. And he certainly wanted the whole Israelites, the whole congregation. And in the book of Acts, it's called the church in the wilderness.
So it's the whole congregation together. That's what God wants. You know, before there was a congregation of Israelites in the wilderness, before there was a new Testament church, where did the worship happen?
It happened in the home amongst the family. And again, at the beginning of the chapter, we saw how this was emphasized. Tell your son and your son's sons the mighty things the Lord did in Egypt. So he wants them all together in the wilderness.
Any questions or comments at this point?
No?
So the family being together is important. And on top of that, as far as passing things down, who is in charge of the religious education of the children? Well, the public school system is, right? That's the pastor's job.
That's the Sunday school teacher's job to teach. So you bring them to church and dump them off and go about your day and someone else will take care of that. Is that the way it's supposed to be? So who's in charge of the religious education of the kids?
Right, the parents. You know, God didn't tell Moses. Well, Aaron's the priest. He's the ordained minister here. Let Aaron teach your children. No, he said, Moses, you do it. They're your sons. They're your kids.
You teach them. And it's the same thing today. You know, learning in church is necessary. Obviously, adults, we need to learn too. Sunday school is great for the kids. But of course, we need more than an hour a week, don't we?
I mean, if you went to, you know, grammar school, high school, college, but you only put in an hour a week, how would that work? You wouldn't learn a whole lot, would you? It's the same with church. If that's all you're getting is one hour per week, you're going to be a babe in Christ for decades.
All right. And that's probably one of the reasons why there are many babes in Christ. I know I'm preaching again, but I just can't, I just can't help it. So point is, teaching should be an ongoing thing.
Moses and all the Israelites, they should have been teaching their children every day. You incorporate it as part of your life and you teach them in the morning. When you get up, you teach them throughout the day, you teach them before they go to.
Bed.
All right. Anything else? No, no one's commenting on this. You all agree. Amen.
All right.
Look at verse 10. Then he that is Pharaoh said to them, the Lord had better be with you when I let you go and your little ones go beware for evil is ahead of you. What's Pharaoh trying to, he's trying to intimidate them a little bit.
It says, not so go now, you who are men and serve the Lord for that is what you desire. And they were driven out from Pharaoh's presence. So this is the first time they're not excused. All right, you can leave now.
No, they're driven out. So Pharaoh's pretty angry at this point. So because Pharaoh's not cooperating, look at verse 12. He had another chance. It says, then the Lord said to Moses, stretch out your hand over the land of Egypt for the locusts, that they may come upon the land of Egypt and eat every herb of the land, all that the hail has left.
So Moses stretched out his rod over the land of Egypt and the Lord brought an east wind on the land all that day and all that night. When it was morning, the east wind brought the locusts. So we talked about this last week, how the plagues were supernatural in nature.
And we talked about, well, you know, sometimes people, scholars, I'm not supposed to call them scholars. What can I call them?
Liberal what?
The people in the, anyways. But they try to come up with natural explanations for these things or no, this really was a natural thing. The Lord didn't do it. Now, this is one situation that could be the Lord using a natural means to bring this about because it's the wind that's bringing them in.
Now it's so many locusts. You could say that maybe there's something supernatural about the sheer numbers, but you go on YouTube because it's darkening the sky, right? I went on YouTube when I was doing the sermon series and Joel, whatever, two years ago, whenever it was, and there are videos, I think it was in Africa of this plague of locusts that it really did darken the sky.
So this type of thing continues to happen to this day. Now I'm assuming it was a lot worse here, but this could be a natural event, but that still doesn't mean that the Lord wasn't in it. So whether it's a supernatural judgment or a natural, the Lord using a natural means, it's still of the Lord, right?
So what does that tell you? God can use both the natural and the supernatural. So when there's an earthquake and a city is destroyed or a flood or something like that, that we would say this is a what?
Well, people do call it an act of God, don't they? Now sometimes we try to discern like, okay, New Orleans, that was, that's a pretty wicked place. So when that happened there, that was God's judgment.
All right, we don't know the details of what's happening and why, but it's not unreasonable to think that God would do things like that. He's done them in the past. All right, well, let's move on. Verse 16, then Pharaoh called for Moses and Aaron in haste and said, I have sinned against the Lord, your God, and against you.
So Pharaoh is confessing his sin. Notice what he says in verse 17, now, therefore, please forgive my sin only this once. What did he say last time? I have sinned this time. Now it's like, forgive my sin, but just this, just this one time, he just doesn't learn.
So he says, therefore, please forgive my sin only this once and entreat the Lord, your God, that he may take away from me this death only or this deadly plague. So he went out from Pharaoh and entreated the Lord.
And the Lord turned a very strong west wind, which took the locusts away and blew them into the Red Sea. There remained not one locust in all the territory of Egypt, but the Lord hardened Pharaoh's heart and he did not let children of Israel go.
So you're just seeing kind of the same thing repeating itself in chapter after chapter. Larry.
Well, it doesn't say so, but it does specifically say that it covered the land of Egypt. I mean, Goshen was still part of that, but I'm assuming that Goshen was spared the locusts. So there was still greenery and just like it does say about the darkness, it's not in Goshen, just in Egypt.
So yeah, and that was another connection with the book of Revelation where God's servants are spared. So one would assume, even if it's not saying it here, the plagues before it, that's what was happening.
They were spared in Goshen and then after it, they were spared. So one would assume that they were spared.
Anything else?
Dennis is a note here from Ryrie where it says a swarm may have an average density of 130 million locusts per square mile, just as a gross, interesting fact.
Wow.
It's like the frogs, you know, frogs, locusts doesn't sound that bad until you think about what that would be like and yeah, that's not fun. So I do not believe, as we saw last time with Pharaoh here saying, you know, forgive me, I've sinned.
I do not believe that this is a true repentance. You know, people can be sorry that something's happening and not truly be sorry before God. I mean, there's a difference.
Janet.
I remember a number of years ago in Ohio, we had locusts.
And I never saw them before. It was just unbearable. They were everywhere. If you were outside, they were in your hair. You know, it's like in the summer or something, you're outside working and you get a gnat.
That flies in the back of your throat.
Well, nevermind. I'm not going to. So false repentance. I think that's what's going on with Pharaoh. Even though he's saying the right thing, you know, there's a difference between having the right words and having the right heart.
Anyone can say words. Anyone can be sorry that, Hey, I'm in a bad situation here. You know, it's another thing to really mean it. And I'm sorry. I'm sorry that I've offended God. I'm sorry that I'm opposing God.
He doesn't say that. I mean, that's really what he should say. So Pharaoh only seems concerned about finding relief from that current plague. And then the next one, you know, same thing. And then finally we come to the ninth plague, the darkness.
Someone had mentioned a couple of weeks ago that the plagues, they really are attacking the deities of Egypt. So Egypt had all of these deities. Who's the most well-known God of Egypt? Not Pharaoh. I mean, most people know that Pharaoh is demands worship as a deity.
Right? Yeah.
Raw the sun God.
So the darkness, obviously this would undermine raw the sun. God.
He's all powerful with the sun shining every day. Well, when Jehovah is done with it, nothing gets through no light at all. Verse 21. Then the Lord said to Moses, stretch out your hand toward heaven, that there may be darkness over the land of Egypt darkness, which may even be felt.
So darkness covers the land, but again, it doesn't strike the Israelites because in the land of Goshen, what does it say? They had light in their dwellings. Now finally Pharaoh tries to negotiate once again, not understanding that partial obedience is really disobedience.
And the chapter ends with verses 27 through 29. It says, but the Lord hardened Pharaoh's heart and he would not let them go. Then Pharaoh said to him, get away from me, take heed to yourselves and see my face no.
More.
For in the day you see my face, you shall die. So Moses said, you have spoken well, I will never see your face again.
