A SEVERE MERCY

[Exodus 6:28ff.]

          Introduction to the Scriptures: Nearly everyone has heard the story of the great plagues which God brought on the Egyptians to get them to release His children from slavery. Our text is about those plagues today, and that covers about four chapters. I’m not going to read all four chapters, and I’m not going to go into any depth on all ten plagues. (In fact, we’re only going to talk about nine of them, so you’ll be relieved! We’ll be out of here by mid-afternoon.) It will sometimes be only a few sentences, but we want to look at the overview, the picture here of what God is doing and see what we can learn. Really most of it we can learn in just a few paragraphs that I’m going to read, beginning with verse 28. It sets the whole of these plagues that you know about already in context. Listen carefully to God’s word. He didn’t do this in a corner. He wanted us to know about it and we want to learn the lesson. I’ve always asked God if I might be a quick study. I’d like to learn without having to undergo His severe judgment. In any case, we watch this story unfold and there is much we can learn from it. Give attention to God’s word: Exodus 6:28.

Now when the LORD spoke to Moses in Egypt, he said to him, “I am the LORD. Tell Pharaoh king of Egypt everything I tell you.” But Moses said to the LORD, “Since I speak with faltering lips, why would Pharaoh listen to me?

          God doesn’t quite say this. This is between the lines, but I think God would say, Moses, were you listening? I just answered that. “Why would Pharaoh listen to me?” Because I am the Lord. It’s me speaking, Moses, not you.

          Chapter 7 begins: “Then the LORD said to Moses, ‘See, I have made you like God to Pharaoh, and your brother Aaron will be your prophet.’ You are only going to speak my words, and he’ll speak yours. ‘You are to say everything I command you, and your brother Aaron is to tell Pharaoh to let the Israelite go out of his country. But I will harden Pharaoh’s heart.’ Now he doesn’t shape Pharaoh’s heart. Pharaoh shapes his own heart, but God says I’m going to use that to accomplish my purpose. ‘. . . though I multiply my miraculous signs and wonders in Egypt [we’re going to come back and look at signs and wonders], he will not listen to you. Then I will lay my hand on Egypt and with mighty acts of judgment [our theme for today] I will [deliver] bring out my divisions, my people the Israelites.

’                                                                                                                                             [Exodus 7:1-4]

[Read Exodus 7:5-24]

Prayer for Illumination – Father, as we look at this story now, so familiar, may we not only see what is happening there, but understand what is happening here. By here we don’t just mean in our world or our nation or our community, but in our own lives. So I ask that you would speak with power. Keep our attention, focus, and let us hear this word and let us know what it is that you want to say to us. We pray it in Jesus’ name, AMEN.

Message

          There is a stage in every person’s life (I can tell you precisely when it begins since I have children and grandchildren) – it begins at age 2, and it continues for a rather long time – when something inside us triggers and prompts the question, “Why?” It does show up at 2 doesn’t it? It’s time for a nap. “Why?” Be sure to eat your broccoli. “Why?” Don’t hit your sister. “Why?” (It continues:) Be home before midnight. “Why?”

          At first we try to explain all the reasons: “It’s good for you. I want you to be safe. You need to learn responsibility.” But eventually, when the very explanations we give are also met with the question, “Why?” most of us revert to the answer we wanted to give in the first place: Because I’m your Mother!! (Because I said so, that’s why!)

          Now once you calm down, you probably feel a twinge of remorse regarding your outburst, and resolve to be more reasonable the next time. But I want you to know this morning that you are actually in very good company with your response. The same response is all over the place in the book of Exodus, in our text today and the supporting documents surrounding it. God says to Moses on Mt. Sinai, “Speak to the entire assembly of Israel and say to them: ‘Be holy . . .’” And they are going to ask you ‘Why?’, and you are going to say, ‘. . . because I, the LORD your God, am holy.’” [Leviticus 19:1-2]

          It’s everywhere in the book of Leviticus. Because I’m the Dad! Because I’m in charge. Because I said so. It’s the reason given for everything: I am the LORD. You should do a study sometime on how often that phrase comes up. I did and I’m going to share a few of them with you, but there are hundreds. Let’s take a quick look at a couple chapters in Leviticus – I just ran straight through the text. You can jump in anywhere. Leviticus 18:1 – “The LORD said to Moses, ‘Speak to the Israelites and say to them: “I am the LORD your God.”’” (They haven’t even asked any questions yet, but this is where God starts, because it’s the reason for everything else He has to say.) “I am the LORD your God. You must not do as they do in Egypt, where you used to live. . . . You must obey my laws and be careful to follow my decrees. I am the LORD your God. Keep my decrees and laws, for the man who obeys them will live by them, I am the LORD.”

          Then He begins to give this whole series of laws about how we live our daily lives in detail: “‘No one is to approach any close relative to have sexual relations. I am the LORD. . . Do not give any of your children to be sacrificed to Molech . . . I am the LORD. . . Keep my requirements and do not follow any of the detestable customs that were practiced before you came . . . I am the LORD your God. . . . Each of you must respect his mother and father, and you must observe my Sabbaths. I am the LORD your God.’” He’s not even giving the reasons, well, at least not the reasons we are looking for. He is just saying, “I am the LORD,” and I’m telling you,

          “‘Do not turn to idols or make gods of cast metal for yourselves. I am the LORD your God. . . When you reap the harvest of your land, do not reap to the very edges of your field . . . or pick up the grapes that have fallen. Leave them for the poor and the alien. [Why?] I am the LORD your God.’” It goes on and on and on. I’ve got a page worth that I’m not even going to read to you. It is the explanation for everything: I am the LORD.

          It is the reason. It is the starting point. It’s the justification. The justification, the motivation, the explanation of absolutely everything. “I am the LORD.” So we are not surprised in the opening verses of our text this morning, to hear God begin His instructions to Moses in Exodus 6:29, by saying exactly that: “I am the LORD.” Let’s put this whole thing in context, Moses. “I am the LORD. Tell Pharaoh king of Egypt everything I tell you.” He knew Moses was going to complain, as in fact he did, “[O Lord,] since I speak with faltering lips, why would Pharaoh listen to me?” There it is. And God says, I knew you were going to ask that question. That’s why I began by answering it. Because “I am the LORD.” That is why you will say it, and that is why Pharaoh will respond, and that is why this mission will ultimately be accomplished. Because “I am the LORD.” And I am sovereign over the entire universe. We have been looking at that for a number of weeks. You know about God’s sovereignty. He says, that’s the reason; that’s all you need to know.

          You understand, that is the fundamental message in these first few paragraphs in chapter 7. “I am the LORD.” I am Yahweh, and I am in charge here. Your only job is to obey. You’ve got it easy really, Moses, for all your complaining. Your job is to obey. My job is to make things happen. Not only that, but you can rest assured that even though Pharaoh “will not listen to you,” I know that and I’ve already told you, let me show you what will happen next. (Verse 4) “Then I will lay my hand on Egypt and with mighty acts of judgment I will bring out my divisions, my people the Israelites. And [then] the Egyptians will know [what? What I’ve been telling you] that I am the LORD.”

          You see, as we have been learning, Yahweh is “The God Who Is” and we will all know Him when that day comes that we also are called to stand before Him. And in that grand and terrible moment, when we stand before the God who is, the God who really is – not the figment of our imagination, the God who is – all our protests and our complaints and our excuses will melt away, and we will say, “How could I have been such a fool?”, and we will know the reason for everything, and we will know it is a very good reason, because “I am the LORD.”

          The whole message today about God’s judgment is summarized in three verses, Exodus 7:3-5. I have a little outline in your bulletins that takes two portions of those three verses and that is what we’re looking at. “But I will harden Pharaoh’s heart, and though I multiply my miraculous signs and wonders [two key words] in Egypt, he will not listen to you. Then I will lay my hand on Egypt and with mighty acts of judgment I will [deliver] bring out . . . my people. . . And the Egyptians will know [what I have been telling you] that I am the LORD.” Everything we are about to uncover here is summed up in four words: “Signs and Wonders” (the first point) and “Judgment and Deliverance” (the second point).

          Let’s just define those first two words which God says He will multiply miraculously before Egypt (and Israel) to make His point. The first word, “signs” (owth in the Hebrew) means essentially “evidence” which authenticates something. It is a sign or signal that points to the reality behind it. In this case, as God makes clear in what transpires next, it will become clear who is really in charge here. This is going to be a sign. You’re going to see, you’re going to know who’s in charge. Or as he says to the pharaoh in chapter 7, verse 17 warning of the plague which is about to strike the Nile River, “By this [sign] you will know that I am the LORD.” That is the purpose of a sign.

          The second word, “wonders” (mofaith in the Hebrew) we spoke of earlier. It is a word which contains something of the idea of miracles. It is a fascinating word, a wonderful word. It contains something of the idea of miracles but with a difference. For the Hebrew this word referred to natural events which were obviously controlled by a supernatural God. They did not expect God to be contradicting His own natural laws. They weren’t looking for miracles in that way. They simply expected Him to use His natural laws effectively in the accomplishment of His purposes. He had done it all the time. So they were not surprised that a wind or a hail storm or a bolt of lightning coming at the right place at precisely the right moment accomplished God’s purpose. That is what a wonder is all about.

          These two words, then, anticipate what God expects to accomplish in the series of plagues He is about to visit upon Egypt – signs and wonders. He will use a series of natural events in a super-natural way to prove himself and accomplish His sovereign purpose. That is what this story is about. He is going to use natural events in a super-natural way to prove himself and to accomplish His sovereign purpose, which you know is to deliver His people from slavery in Egypt.

          Now, the first thing that happens is not one of the plagues, but it sets the stage for what God wants to reveal through the plagues, so it is a very important sign to the pharaoh. When Moses and Aaron arrive before Pharaoh, they are to take that staff and throw it on the ground before Pharaoh, and it will become a serpent, God says. And Pharaoh, by the way, would understand exactly what Moses and Aaron were getting at here. He could read between the lines easily enough. In a few months, a number of us will visit the archaeological museum in Cairo, Egypt, where among other things we will see the treasures unearthed from the tomb of another pharaoh from very close to this same time. We will see what all of us see in the most popular pictures of Egyptian treasures – I would guess the image coming to your mind when I speak of Egyptian treasures, the crown or headpiece of Pharaoh Tutankhamun. And in the center, just above the Pharaoh’s forehead, we will see an image of a serpent. That was prominent for the pharaoh, in fact an Egyptian spitting cobra; it rose just above the pharaoh’s forehead as a challenge to anyone who confronted the pharaoh.

          So here’s the pharaoh with his headpiece and the serpent there. And Moses and Aaron walk up and they know, as the people of Egypt know, that the serpent is a symbol of sovereignty, a symbol of royalty, of deity, and of divine authority for the Egyptians. So in this little miracle of turning a shepherd’s staff into a serpent, Moses’ God is saying, “Oh really? Divine authority? I don’t think so.” He throws his stick down and it becomes a serpent. But Pharaoh has a few tricks up his sleeve as well. He has sorcerers who, he thinks, will put Moses and Aaron back in their place, because they can do this trick also. Whether they do it by sleight of hand, we don’t know – or by a little anatomical trick snake-handlers know of pinching a particular nerve which causes the snake to become entirely rigid, so it might look like a stick, but it moves when they release it – or whether it is the actual occult, I don’t know. But it doesn’t really matter, because God still makes His point. Moses’ staff eats up the rest of the staffs, the rest of the snakes. The Hebrew word actually isn’t “swallows up;” it’s “gulps them down.” You can almost see God smiling rather wryly – “Don’t mess with yahweh. You’re an amateur.”

          But the pharaoh has not gotten his reputation as a bold, stubborn, hard-headed, uncompromising leader by backing away from challenges so, as we might anticipate, the contest is on. God has revealed this already to Moses. And God is going to use Pharaoh’s hard heart to make His own point as clearly and unequivocally as possible. When He is done, there will be no mistaking who is in charge here.

          Verse 14 of chapter 7 says, “Then the LORD said to Moses, ‘Pharaoh’s heart is unyielding; he refuses to let the people go. Go to Pharaoh in the morning as he goes out to the water.” Now he is not going swimming or fishing. This is a ritual because the Egyptians saw the Nile as a god that brought them life. And Moses’ God is going to say, Ah, but who gives life to the Nile, that she may pass it on to you? Remember the “signs and wonders.” This event may be explained in a natural way, but God will use it to prove Himself as the supreme being behind it all.

          So Moses and Aaron meet the Pharaoh at the Nile. They tell him “By this you will know that I am the LORD:” it’s a sign, this is what God wants to prove, “. . . strike the water of the Nile” with the same staff that had eaten the Pharaoh’s serpents; and the water in fact turns into a thick red, sluggish liquid that looks and acts like blood, and the fish begin to die, and the river stinks and you can’t drink it. It’s not actually blood, of course. The Egyptians, desperate for water, are able to dig in the sand near the Nile and get actual water – whatever is here, that’s been filtered, but something is happening here. In fact it is a natural phenomena. A similar phenomenon has happened at other times; it is documented historically. It was probably due to a combination of natural phenomena accompanying higher than usual flooding. Several theories have been put forward, but the best seems to be a red algae which appeared to thicken the water, and accompanying bacteria which killed the fish and made it undrinkable. But what a remarkable coincidence! It just sort of happened the very moment that Aaron stretched out the rod over the Nile and struck it at God’s command!

          If the Pharaoh is at all unsettled by this phenomenon, he doesn’t show it. You know what he’s thinking: We can survive this. It will pass. Seven days later, however, chapter 8 tells us, Moses goes back to Pharaoh and says, “Yahweh says: ‘Let my people go . . .’” Maybe you weren’t listening. “Let my people go . . . [or] I will plague your whole country with frogs.” Pharaoh scoffs, so Aaron does it, and a really horrid plague of frogs comes up out of the Nile and invades every house, every bed, every kitchen pot, everything they have, and it is not a nice time in Egypt. This is again natural, of course. The frogs would desert the waters of the Nile and the banks clogged with decomposing fish. But once again, the timing is pretty good to make God’s point, is it not?

          Now another interesting thing is being pointed out in this story, because with this and the previous plague Pharaoh’s magicians are also able to do the same thing. But I don’t think that is too helpful. All they have really done is added to the problem. A real miracle would have been to reverse it. They don’t seem to be able to do that, and the pharaoh recognizes that and he says, Moses will you turn this thing off. Moses, conscious of God’s purpose, says in the 9^th verse of chapter 8, Sure I’ll do it. You name the time. He wants to make sure the pharaoh knows, so he says: Yeah, I know it’s a natural event, but you name the time. We’ll see who’s in charge here. So Pharaoh names the time, and the frogs die off en masse on the appointed day, and God has clearly made His point once again. The Pharaoh had promised to cooperate, but of course, once the difficulty was passed, he reneged on his promise. We’ll see this again and again. (Hmmm! Have you ever done that with a promise you made to God at a time of distress in your life? You know: If you let me off the hook here I’ll do this. But once we’re free from the problem . . . It’s not just about the pharaoh, is it? This lesson is for us.)

          Well, God follows that plague with what our translation calls a plague of gnats. The type of insect actually isn’t clear from the word. It could be a number of different kinds of insects. Many scholars and scientists believe it was mosquitoes. The text tells us they were something like clouds of dust in the air and on men and beasts. I have to tell you I’ve been in the midst of a similar plague as a boy. I tell you wonderful stories about South Dakota where I grew up, but it wasn’t always wonderful. Several of these plagues seem very familiar! I suppose it was similar circumstances. Here there would have been stagnant pools left from the previous plagues, and they gave birth to billions of mosquitoes. This is going to sound like an exaggeration to you, but I remember a plague of mosquitos when I was a boy working at a gas station. The fumes from the gas and the oil kept the mosquitos away, but when I left work I would literally run to get home because there would be great, black clouds of mosquitoes along the way. I remember on the lee side of your body as you ran, the back of my jeans would be black, all the way solid, black with mosquitos. You would hit the back of your leg and you would kill 50 or 60 mosquitos with one swat. That was a plague, and I sort of understand why Pharaoh’s sorcerers came to plead with Pharaoh. They weren’t able to do this one, and I don’t think they really wanted to do this one, but they said, You know what? This is the hand of God. “This is the finger of God,” and you need to pay attention.

          But Pharaoh was dismissive, so the LORD brought a further plague of swarms of flying insects, which probably bred in the decaying corruption of the previous plagues. The Greek translation of this text suggests these were “dog-flies” like the modern gadfly with a painful bite. But this time, since the timing of the natural miracles had not impressed Pharaoh, God had Moses point out that, by the way, have you noticed the Israelites are not being plagued with the same things you are being plagued with. Have you thought that through? Pharaoh makes a half-hearted attempt to negotiate with Moses, and Moses counters by calling off the plague. There is a lot of mercy in this. It’s not all harsh. He gives him a chance every time, but Pharaoh really had no intention of complying.

          So the next plague is a terrible disease which strikes the Egyptians’ livestock. Once again this is a natural event, but rather obvious supernatural timing and purpose. The plague is probably skin anthrax, carried by the bite of the previous insects from the bacteria which had killed the marine life. We are speculating, but there is a natural progression to all these. The Israelites once again are spared, and the pharaoh once again is unyielding.

          The next plague of festering sores or boils could have resulted from the skin anthrax. And despite the threat in 9:13, “Let my people go, so that they may worship me, or this time I will send the full force of my plagues against you and against your officials and your people, so you may know that there is no one like me in all the earth,” despite the fact that God is saying to them, You haven’t seen anything yet, the pharaoh once again will not relent.

          You don’t understand, God had Moses explain, [Exodus 9:15], “For by now I could have stretched out my hand and struck you and your people with a plague that would have wiped you off the earth. But I have raised you up for this very purpose, that I might show you my power and that my name might be proclaimed in all the earth.” Which is why we are proclaiming it today and have been proclaiming it. Everybody knows the story. So another plague: He brings a gigantic hail storm which wipes out the flax and barley crops. Their livestock has already been struck down, now the crops. But now the recalcitrant pharaoh was, as we often become, irrational in his refusal to acknowledge God. So the next plague follows that one, probably a month or two later, when the next crops are already up. It is the plague of locusts. Everybody in the Middle East certainly knows about the locusts as do some of the folks in Middle America. A locust will consume its own weight every day – eating through everything which had escaped the previous plague – and leave the land bare. Locust swarms have been known to cover as many as 400 square miles, and even one square mile could teem with over one hundred million of these voracious insects. So this is a serious plague, and pharaoh’s resistance now has cost his country their water supply, their health, their livestock, and now all their annual crops.

          It is a harsh world. But as every plague had come and gone, God had not only inflicted it upon the pharaoh’s people, but each time, despite the pharaoh’s duplicity, And God had mercifully ended the plague at the very time He had predicted. There are all kinds of chances for Pharaoh to change his course here. It was very obvious to everyone what was happening. But the pharaoh would not relent. Even when his associates tried to convince him, he wouldn’t relent. Even in the face of God’s undeserved mercy he wouldn’t relent. So the decimated land responded with yet another plague, the timing of which Moses predicted perfectly. With the crop cover gone, and the layers of silt from the flooding of the Nile, the wind kicks up and one of those periodic sandstorms called the khamsin erupted on cue, blotting out the sun for three days of absolute darkness. That can happen. I didn’t want to mention all of these plagues, but I’ve run across most of them at one time or another. I can remember it being absolutely dark in the middle of the day with a dust storm when I was a boy growing up. So they have three 3 days of darkness. Pharaoh tries once again to negotiate, even though it should be clear by now that Moses holds all the cards, and when Moses refuses to compromise, the pharaoh explodes in anger and says if they ever appear before him again, he will have them killed.

          Moses says: Fine! You just go ahead and do that. “Just as you say.” But implicit in his response is the tacit warning, I think you are gong to live to regret that decision. We know the death of the firstborn son of every family in Egypt, including the Pharaoh, is coming. We are going to look at that, along with God’s mercy next week. But it is also quite clear that the responsibility for this judgment lies on them alone.

          Now I want to move from this story, as we come to the conclusion, and look at the New Testament, because we are dealing with exactly the same thing. The apostle Paul writes in Romans 1 to later generations of people who “know-it-all,” who want it their way, who refuse to acknowledge God. He writes, “The wrath of God [harsh phrase] is being revealed from heaven against all the godlessness and wickedness of men who suppress the truth [they know the truth, but they suppress it] by their wickedness, since what may be known about God is plain to them . . .” What may be known about God is plain to us. We may accept it, or we may reject it. But if we reject it, we, like they, as he writes in Romans 1, “are without excuse. For although they knew God, they neither glorified him as God nor gave thanks to him, but their thinking became futile and their foolish hearts were darkened.” Is that a description of the pharaoh? He knew God. He had seen Him in action, but he refused to acknowledge Him, and the result was he couldn’t even think straight anymore. He is making a series of more and more foolish decisions, and God’s judgment is raining down on him as a result.

          So God’s final judgment on the Egyptians is about to fall. But let’s step back and take a look at this. I think some-times we are inclined to think God is treating them rather harshly. What is this about God’s judgment? Isn’t He supposed to be a gracious and merciful God? But it is essential for us to realize that judgment is nothing more nor less than the flip side of God’s mercy, which is His promised deliverance. Remember what will come from this judgment. It will be the deliverance of His people. What you and I must realize is that we cannot have the one without the other. We cannot have deliverance without judgment. And that is true in our personal lives as well as in our nation and in our world. There is no deliverance if the evil which has held us in bondage is not simply eliminated. If we are going to be set free, there has to be judgment on that which holds us back, which imprisons us. Now God tried all kinds of other things. He tried being kind to the Egyptians and their Pharaoh. He tried reasoning with them. He tried warning them. He tried letting them sample a lesser judgment. He tried offering them His grace and mercy again and again. But each time what happened? It was refused. You can hardly blame God for this. There would be, as must always be the case, no deliverance without judgment on the unrepentant offender.

          God’s people could not be delivered without some form of judgment on those who held them in slavery. And it is true as well that our deliverance personally cannot be accomplished without judgment on the sin which holds us in slavery. We’re not in bondage to some other nation. We’re not that kind of slaves, but our slavery runs a whole lot deeper because we are in bondage to the sinful desires of our own hearts. And until God judges that and releases us from that bondage, we cannot know His deliverance.

          Our society is incensed by the thought of God’s wrath. But there are a couple of things we need to know about God’s wrath. The first is that it is never imposed arbitrarily – it is always chosen. He even gives us a lot of opportunities to choose something else. The second – and this is truly profound, the bottom line of our message today – is that God’s wrath is simply the other side of His mercy, a severe mercy, but a mercy that is only accomplished through judgment. Wrath is the prerequisite for mercy. Think about it. There are tons of illustrations: If someone is attacking my child, my wrath against the attacker is a virtue, not a vice. If I am trying to escape a burning building and a locked door bars my way, I’d better be prepared to take a hatchet to that door! I’m a little hard on the door, but it’s the only way I’m going to escape. That’s what God’s judgment is all about. The sources of bondage and of evil and of death must be eliminated if we are to know freedom and delight and life. You cannot have the one without the other. The malignant cancer in our gut must be dealt with and dealt with harshly or it will destroy us.

          And the moral cancer of sin is exactly the same thing. It is true of moral surgery just as it is of physical surgery. Jesus, by the way, ties these together. When he says in the sermon on the mount, “If your right eye causes you to sin, gouge it out and throw it away,” we think that sounds pretty harsh, but he is not recommending some sort of perverse self-mutilation. He is recommending moral surgery. He says, get rid of anything at all that causes you to sin. Whatever it is, get rid of it, be as harsh with it as necessary, because if you don’t, what is coming beyond that is going to be worse. Judge it or the final judgment will be far worse! For if you cannot get free of your slavery to sin, the final judgment is much more harsh. “It is better for you to lose one part of your body than for your whole body to be thrown into hell.” He is simply saying that judgement must precede deliverance.

          Do you begin to see both the necessity and, if you look at it properly, the beauty of God’s wrath, because it is the only way all that is good can be accomplished? He is the surgeon who says, “I detest cancer and what it does to you, and I do not intend to leave one malignant cell in your body. When I am done with this surgery it is all going to be gone.” If we do not know what is going on, surgery may look like some kind of bloody horror. But if we do know what is going on, and watch the skillful turn of the surgeon’s knife, deftly removing the invasive fingers of the cancer from the surrounding healthy tissue, we realize that this truly is a thing of beauty! Dr. Paul Brand, the surgeon, introduced me in his book to that whole idea that surgery can be something beautiful. And God’s surgery – his judgment on what is evil – can be beautiful too.

          The apostle Paul, writing in Romans 11:22, urges us to consider an interesting phrase. In the King James it is the “goodness and severity” of the Lord. “Goodness and severity?” Those two words sound contradictory to us. The image Paul is using there in Romans 11 is really quite similar to the one we are using here. He is talking about the tree surgeon who may cut off and burn the diseased or dead branches, and who may also graft in the healthy branches so they become fruitful. That is the “goodness and severity” of the Lord.

          J. I. Packer, in his book, Knowing God, challenges those both inside and outside the church who, if they believe in God at all, see him as some sort of celestial Santa Claus, handing out goodies and patting people on the head. We have made up our own god who is infinitely forbearing and kind. “Yet,” he says, “the Santa Claus theology carries within itself the seeds of its own collapse, for it cannot cope with the fact of evil.” It doesn’t deal with evil. God’s judgment alone deals with evil. And if evil is not dealt with, there is no deliverance and nothing good can come. But God wants us to know what is good, so be assured He will deal with evil. He loves us, so He will not be dissuaded from judgment. If you and I will acknowledge and release to Him that moral cancer that is harbored in our bodies, He will deal with that sin in judgment that He might ultimately deliver us. It may sound severe, but it is a severe mercy.

Closing prayer – Father, we don’t really like your stories about judgment very much. Oh we feel like there are a lot of folks out there who deserve judgment from time to time, but we live in a time when everybody says, We just need to be nice to everyone and everything will be fine. You never really said that, although you are kind. You are gracious almost to a fault. You offered Pharaoh here at least ten chances to back off of his stubbornness and his rebellion, but he didn’t do it and the judgment had to fall. Well, we know that in the story, but for us it’s the same story, and I am afraid that many of us have thought that maybe the sin in our lives wasn’t that serious a matter, maybe it didn’t really have to be excised. But it does, or we will only know death. So I pray that you would save us through your judgment. Just ahead in this story we will see one of the unexpected ways that judgment might bring us mercy. But I pray that we would be willing to have you remove from us the evil that plagues us, that keeps us in bondage, that we might know your deliverance and we might know your life, through Jesus Christ our Lord, AMEN.