Sermon Tone Analysis

We are turning pages in the book of Exodus—we’re flying through Exodus…only 30 chapters to go after today!

If you have your Bible (and I hope you do), please turn with me to Exodus 9-10 (page 99 in the red pew Bible in front of you).

Keep the text open in front of you as we look at these two plagues together this morning.

There is so much similarity in the format of these plagues—Plagues #7 and 8—we’re going to look at them side-by-side, and see what the Lord is doing.

Turns out the Lord is up to something, then and there in Egypt and here and now in our lives.

The Lord is dealing with Pharaoh and the Egyptians with these plagues, striking them with these judgments.

He doesn’t stop with one or two.

He’s gonna smack them with ten.

These are Plagues 7 & 8.

And they are rough: the worst hailstorm in history and a whole mess of locusts.

These are plagues meant to humble.

>As we look at these two plagues side-by-side, we see that they have the same driving force, the same ultimate purpose as one another (and as the other plagues).

The plague of hail:

The plague of locusts:

The ultimate purpose, the driving force behind these two plagues is the worship of the Lord.

Biblically, one could argue that this is the reason the Lord does everything He does.

The people of the Lord are meant to worship the Lord.

And as long as Pharaoh holds onto them, refusing to let them go, the people of the Lord can’t worship as they are meant to worship.

Pharaoh is stubborn.

What’s more, Pharaoh thinks himself more persistent, more stubborn than the Lord!

That’s hilarious.

Pharaoh thinks he will have his way, no matter what anyone else—including the Lord—wants.

“Whoops-a-daisy, there Pharaoh.

You are woefully mistaken.”

The Lord will have His way, always.

In this case, He will have nothing less than the unconditional release and freedom of His people so that they can worship Him.

>The Lord makes His purpose very clear.

His reason for these plagues is stated at the outset of both:

Do you see what He’s doing?

He’s doing all this for the praise of His name.

He has the end result in mind.

He has goals.

These are His goals for the plagues:

That He might show His power

That His name might be proclaimed in all the earth

That His people would tell their children and grandchildren about His power and authority

The Lord has worked miraculously and has (miraculously) not wiped Pharaoh off the face of the earth, so that He might show His power.

Check!

Done and done.

Well before the plagues of hail or locust, the Lord has shown His power.

Water into blood, frogs, gnats, flies, dead livestock, festering boils.

The Lord is using these plagues, using Pharaoh, using the Egyptians so that His name—the name of the Lord Yahweh—would be proclaimed in all the earth.

And boy, if plagues weren’t an effective way to accomplish this!

The Lord wanted to be worshipped around the world.

And what better way to make that happen than to send the Egyptians plague after plague, saving His people from and through the plagues?

God’s people never forgot God’s triumph over Pharaoh—how could they?

But they weren’t the only ones who would speak down throughout the years, recounting what the Lord had done.

Word of the plagues spread to the surrounding nations.

Later in the history of God’s people, in the book of Joshua, when the Gibeonites meet with Joshua, they will speak of the fame of the Lord your God.

They will say that they have heard reports of Him, all that He did in Egypt.

Much later, the Philistines said of the Lord when up against His people: “We’re doomed!

Who will deliver us…[Their God] is the one who struck the Egyptians with all kinds of plagues...”

Much, much later, Paul praises God for the plaguing of Pharaoh, using it to highlight God’s Sovereignty.

The plagues made God famous.

The plagues were part of God’s missionary purpose to glorify His name in all the earth.

This, why we sing: “Let heaven and nature sing, let heaven and nature sing, let heaven and nature sing.”—that

God’s name would be proclaimed in all the earth is the point of the plagues.

That God’s name would be proclaimed in all the earth is our task, our commission, our goal.

This is our missionary mandate.

This is why we preach, this is why we make disciples, this is why we go and support those who go to the ends of the earth.

The Lord’s third-stated reason for the plagues: that His people would tell [their] children and grandchildren all about Him and what He has done.

What a story to tell your children and grandchildren!

My Grandma Lindy was a nationally-ranked storyteller.

When Bethany and I stayed with Grandma she’d tell us stories before nap time and before bedtime.

My mom had several siblings, all of whom were great story fodder and occupied the starring roles in Grandma’s stories.

I’d climb into bed, Grandma would come sit on the edge, and I’d make my request: “Uncle Lee!” or “Aunt Sandye!” Grandma would pause for a moment, loading the memory, and regale me with a story the childhood of whichever family member I selected.

Imagine if your mom/dad/grandma/grandpa was among the Israelites who lived through the plagues in Egypt.

You’d set up in bed and say: “The one about the frogs!” or “Locusts!” and listen, over and over, as the Lord’s miraculous work in Egypt was recounted to you.

In a way, it’s almost like we’ve been sitting at our Great-Great-Great-Great Grandpa Moses’ feet over the last month, listening to stories about the Lord’s power.

The plagues are meant to lead us to worship; the plagues are meant to humble.

You’d think Pharaoh would understand this, having seen firsthand the power of the Lord.

But Pharaoh can’t see this; his heart is hard and exceedingly prideful.

In his mind (and the mind of all the Egyptians), Pharaoh is deity, Pharaoh is supreme, Pharaoh controls all things.

Now that He’s up against the One true and only God, well, Pharaoh’s pride has been taking quite the beating.

>Here again, the Lord says, “Let my people go, so that they may worship me,

So that you may know there is no one like me in all the earth.

If Pharaoh didn’t know by now that there was no one like the Lord in all the earth, he was about to understand (to some degree) that not even Pharaoh was a match for the Lord Yahweh.

The Lord is doing all of this to humble Pharaoh.

It’s humbling to admit that there is no one like the Lord.

In case you, like me, are tempted to believe that this has no direct application, no bearing on your life—you’d better lookout.

We probably aren’t as brazen or as direct as Pharaoh in asserting our deity, our authority, but in practice, we live as if we are the kings and queens of our lives.

When in truth, there is no one like the Lord, not one who can compare.

Or, worse yet, how often do we look to something or someone beside the Lord or in addition to the Lord to do what only He can do, to give what only He can give?

The Lord is about to do something in Egypt before Pharaoh that only the One true God—the One who controls the Universe—is able to do.

This was going to be the hardest strike against Egypt yet—what God called “the full force of my plagues.”

The Lord tells Pharaoh (v.

15):

Pharaoh’s pride gets in the way of him understanding the truth that the Lord held his very life and the lives of all those in Egypt in His mighty hand.

It’s humbling to realize the Lord could wipe us off the face of the earth.

There’s a purpose for the plagues and it’s not to annihilate the Egyptians at the first sign of their resistance.

The Lord who could wipe them off the earth could have snapped His fingers and been done with Pharaoh.

With a word, the Lord could have said—“Enough”—and disappeared the Egyptians for good.

The Lord is showing His power over all creation by executing these plagues, though He could have been rid of Pharaoh long ago.

Dr. Gene Cannata, the doctor who delivered me, ended up becoming the step-father of my classmate and good friend, Adam.

In grade school and Junior High, I spent a lot of time at Adam’s house and with his family.

On a handful of occasions, Dr. Cannata would borrow a line and tell me, in an effort to get me to behave: “I brought you into this world and I’ll take you out!”

I don’t think he was serious, and I never put much stock in it, but it made me think: “How, exactly, might he take me out of the world?”

This truth should humble Pharaoh, the knowledge that the Lord could, in fact, wipe him and everyone else off the face of the earth.

It’s humbling to realize what the Lord can do.

The Lord is awesome in power.

And Pharaoh has no real idea; he’s getting glimpses of the Lord’s omnipotence, one snapshot after another of the Almighty’s almighty power.