Exodus 9:13-11:10
What’s It Take to Get Through?

I. what’s it going to take to get through to him or her?
A. People Living With Obvious Problems: bad relationships, over spending, Buddhism, ignorant opinions, etc.
1. About homosexuality: What’s it going to take to break-through to people when they deny the obvious?
B. Why pummel Egypt like this? (9:13-17)
1. Are some people too hard, unreachable, impossible to break through to? Like Judas, “the son of perdition”.
2. Why did God create them only to punish them? To know and to show:
3. “So that you may know that there is none like Me.” (9:14): the Lord is like nothing we’ve ever known
4. “But for this purpose I have raised you up” (or ‘let you live’): (1) to “see my power” and (2), “so that My name may be declared in all the earth”; for them knowing (His power) and people showing (His name).
5. People exalt their opinions thinking they are the center of the universe and God exists to cater to them.
II. The Final Round
A. Hail (9:18-35): the only blow in which they are told how to protect themselves
1. The warning: tomorrow “very heavy” hail will come. If they “fear the ... Lord” they can protect themselves.
a. You’ve been warned. The Lord says it’s better to cut off your hand than to fall into sin — if it’s the problem.
b. If you believe that you cannot serve both God and money, you’re willing to sacrifice business.
2. the will: that you will know that “the earth is the Lord’s” (9:29)
3. the withdrawal: Pharaoh confesses, in verse 27, “I have sinned . . .”
a. Moses will pray but, “I know that you do not yet fear the Lord God.” (9:30)
b. Pharaoh wanted to avert the consequences, like a lot of people, suffering some problem, like prison.
4. the willfulness: he sinned yet again and hardened his heart. He is responsible.
a. Same incident: 10:1. The Lord says, “I have hardened his heart”. The Lord says He did it.
b. How can God command something but then work to ensure the command won’t be obeyed?
c. God’s will of command and His will of decree: the Lord is decreeing that His own commands be disobeyed.
(1) that I may show: to show His power — and His mercy to those He saved, even when He didn’t have to.
(2) that you may tell: especially children and our grandchildren, of how great the Lord is.
(3) that you may know: His absolute power and our complete dependence.
5. To those who say “It’s not fair,” what does it take to get through to us that God is God and we’re not?
D. Locusts (10:1-20)
1. the warning: whatever is left from the hail, locusts will take care of; they’ll cover the ground.
2. the will: Pharaoh tries to negotiate with God, then is “angry with God”, is sinful and self-righteous.
a. People try to negotiate with God: If He’ll heal, they’ll go back to church. If He’ll prosper, they’ll give 10%.
b. As though we have some kind of leverage with God. We don’t have any leverage with God!
3. the withdrawal: another shallow confession just to avoid the consequences
4. the willfulness: the ultimate cause is that the Lord hardened his heart (10:20).
C. Darkness (10:21-29): the Lord is discrediting the chief Egyptian God, Ra, the sun god
1. the warning: No warning! The Lord will blot out the sun in Egypt, except for where the Israelites were.
2. the will: Pharaoh tries to negotiate again, to dim torch light. Then, angry, he threatens to kill Moses.
III. The Final Warning (11): Moses’ parting words to Pharaoh
1. The Lord has told Moses already what is coming (11:1-3). So he warns Pharaoh of the final blow.
2. At midnight, every first born of the land of Egypt shall die, even Pharaoh’s son.
3. People today have the warning of hell, of eternal destruction but, still, they don’t listen.
IV. Invitation: What does it take to get through to a man like Pharaoh or people like us? The Lord is discrediting our gods — gods of romance, or the dollar — while we angrily, self-righteously demand, threaten, refuse. The only thing that will get through to us is that the God who can harden would graciously choose to soften. It takes God’s grace.