FBC Daily Devotional – Feb. 24, 2021

Faith Baptist Church

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Well, here we are, reached the midpoint of the week, and I trust your week has gone well.

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Things are moving along smoothly in your area of responsibility, whatever that might be in the course of this week.

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Well, have you ever been so demoralized or so discouraged or you felt so defeated that it didn't seem to matter what anybody said?

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They could open the Scriptures, they could go to the Psalms, they could go to some passage of Scripture to try to encourage you, and it just, you couldn't hear it.

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You couldn't hear it. It was just, nothing helped. I remember years ago hearing a preacher talk about how to encourage people who are totally demoralized, totally discouraged.

01:08

They're going through terrible, terrible difficulty, a terrible crisis in their lives. And he took us to a bunch of passages of Scripture, one of them, of course,

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Romans chapter 8, verse 28, we know that all things work together for good. But then he said this, he said this, he said, be careful about using

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Romans 8, 28 in the middle of the tragedy, in the middle of the crisis, because the person is probably going to be so demoralized, so discouraged, that it won't feel very good.

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It won't be encouraging. And his advice was, be sure to be building these truths into people's lives.

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He was speaking to pastors, of course. He said, be building these truths into people's lives so that when the crisis comes, they have the promises, they have the resources to rely upon.

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Well, that's true, and I appreciate that advice. But what I got from that, one thing

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I got from that is what we actually see in our reading today in Exodus chapter 5, and that is that people can become so discouraged, so defeated, so demoralized, even hopeless, that they don't believe anything is going to change for the better.

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And so that's what we actually see in Exodus chapter 6. In verse 9, it says,

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Moses spoke this to the people of Israel, and what he spoke was that God came back to Moses and promised he's going to let the people go, they're going to be delivered from slavery and all the rest of this.

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This is on the heels of the additional workload that's been placed upon them, and this load is so heavy now.

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And so Moses is thinking, I just heard this word from the Lord, he said he's going to deliver his people, so I'm going to go back to the people,

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I'm going to tell them this is what the Lord said. So he goes back to the people, he tells them what the Lord says, and it says,

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Moses spoke this to the people of Israel, but, listen to how this verse continues, chapter 6, verse 9, they did not listen to Moses, they didn't want to hear it, they wouldn't listen to him.

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Why? Look at what it says, because of their broken spirit and harsh slavery.

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Their circumstances were so dire, so grievous, they were so weighed down, their spirit was broken, and in that broken spirit, they couldn't hear it, they didn't want to listen.

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I don't want to hear it. It's like Moses comes and says this, and they say, I don't want to hear it, I don't want to hear it. Now, what does the

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Lord do about that? What does the Lord do about that? When he sees you in such a broken spirit that you say,

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I can't even listen, I can't even listen to the promises of God. God says he's going to do thus and so to help me out and meet my needs and all that kind of thing, and you're so broken that you say,

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I can't even hear it. How does the Lord respond? Well, what he did in Exodus was he said,

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Moses, go into Pharaoh, tell Pharaoh to let my people go. In other words,

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God didn't say, well, okay, if that's the way you're going to be about it, forget it, forget it, you can just wallow there in your slavery and you can deal with your misery, that's the way you want it, okay.

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It's not what he did. It's not what he did. Instead, he continued working to bring about the fulfillment of his promised purpose.

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He sent Moses and Aaron right back into Pharaoh, and even though when

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God came to Moses and said, okay, Moses, go into Pharaoh, get back at it, even

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Moses said, Lord, he says, the people of Israel have not listened to me.

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How in the world is Pharaoh going to listen to me? Why should I do this? Nobody's going to listen to me.

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Again, the Lord didn't say, well, all right, that's the way you're going to be, forget it, have a good day, no.

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He said, he spoke to Moses and Aaron, and he gave them a charge about the people of Israel and about Pharaoh, king of Egypt, to bring the people of Israel out of the land of Egypt.

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Instead of writing Moses off, slapping him upside the head and saying, get out of here, he did give him a little slap upside the head and say,

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Moses, Moses, get back at it. You are going to deliver the people out of Egypt.

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Pharaoh is eventually going to let the people go. Get back at it. And then you come to chapter seven after this genealogy of Moses and Aaron, they were from the tribe of Levi, and you get to chapter seven and verses one to 24 of chapter seven, and what happens?

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Moses and Aaron go before Pharaoh and they start unleashing the plagues, and we're going to be seeing those in our readings in the days to come.

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So aren't you grateful that the Lord doesn't just write us off when, you know, in our discouragement, sometimes our despair, sometimes our hopelessness, we can't even bring ourselves to hear with faith the promises of God.

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I'm grateful for his grace. I am so grateful for his mercy, and I trust you are too.

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Father, we do thank you for your patience with us. We thank you that you, who have a promised purpose for your people, you will fulfill it.

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You will bring it about. You will bring it to pass. We may need to be chastened in the process, but you're not going to leave us to wallow in our own misery.

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You're going to accomplish your purpose, and we thank you, and we praise you for that. So bless the remainder of this day, and we ask it in Jesus' name.

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Amen. All right, so on this middle of the week, Wednesday, if you can make it to the

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Bible study prayer time tonight at the church, you have a time for kids as well. That's at 645, and Bible study at 7.

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If you're in the area and can make it for that, you're more than welcome. Otherwise, have a good day. May the