CHAPTER 11
VS 4-5 No distinction between the rich who dwelt in Pharaoh's home and the poor who lived and worked down at the handmill performing manual labor. Any and all who belong to Egypt will suffer devastation.
VS 6 This will be the worst thing that will ever happen to Egypt. Ever. And take it from God, He knows. He knows all that has yet to happen to Egypt. This will be utter devastation nationwide with each and every home affected.
VS 7 God Himself will come down from His heavenly dwelling to pursue the Egyptians. Heaven will growl and snarl and hunt and catch its prey while mean, snarly, stray dogs will calmly watch Israel walk right on by. This is a time and place where dogs where more feral than friendly. Think even now how most dogs react to a stranger approaching the house. Their instinct is to growl and bark. Back then every person was a stranger because no one owned or kept dogs. And not a single one of them would so much as show their teeth to an Israelite as they walked right out of Egypt. See the contrast. Heaven itself will bite Egypt and the earth will not so much as bark at Israel.
VS 8 Moses stormed out of Pharaoh's presence with HOT NOSTRILS, FIERCE ANGER, breathing out of his nose, fuming mad, furious, in a rage at Pharaoh's hardness of heart. Pharaoh's arrogant ignorance exasperated Moses. Pharaoh was going to suffer unspeakable agony and the worst part of it was he was going to bring it upon himself. Pharaoh is willfully ignorant as the TOG class would label it. He knows better and He is choosing to resist. He has seen God's power, He has trembled under its heaviness and yet he has only calloused his heart in the process. His heart has been made raw and rubbed off so many times that it is now impenetrable.
CHAPTER 12
VS 1-2 This event will reorient all time and history for Israel. Everything will be referenced back to this event. Whatever month it is, this marks the beginning of your calendar. This is the first, most important month for you from now on. All time and history from this day forward will be a reference back to this event, much like our history is divided into BC and AD. I'm old enough to remember when history was divided by Before Christ and Anno Domini (in the year of our Lord). Nowadays it has been "updated" to BCE and CE, before common era and common era, but the one thing the history snobs have failed to realize is that you can call that separation whatever you want, BCE and CE or Old School and New School or what have you, but what is the thing that divides those two chunks of time? What single-handedly redefined all time and history? The life, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ smack dab in between two worlds, the world before He descended to earth and the world after He ascended back to Heaven.
VS 3-4 Every household was to have a lamb. And if your household was too small for a lamb, you were to join the household next to you until you had enough people to have a lamb. God makes a clear order: every household must have a lamb and He makes a way to ensure anyone who desires to participate will not be restricted by their family's size or socio-economic status. God makes a way for all who desired to participate and leaves no excuse for all who desire to abstain.
VS 5-6 the lamb must be spotless, a male, 1 yr old. This is not just whatever lamb you might find laying around your flock, this is not the worst lamb you have, this is not the lamb you were going to get rid of anyway, this is a very specific, very special lamb: pristine in every way. This will be performed at twilight when the light of day is expiring the darkness of night is threatening to take over. These are the last minutes of light in the day anyone will see and for those who are in faith filled homes, the last color they will see is RED. Their doorways will be muddy, dark, unoxygenated blood, rich dark, thick red hastily, quickly painted on the entire doorway. This is the last color you see before the light runs out. Dark, Deep, Red.
VS 7 the sacrificial blood of the spotless lamb must be applied to the entire entrance of the home. The two doorposts and the lintel over the doorway. The entire entrance to the home would be marked and painted by the blood of the lamb. There would be no way to enter the home without being surrounded by blood.
VS 12-13 This is personal. God is going to personally come down and do this. He doesn't want anyone mistaking it as a coincidence or as a natural disaster or an epidemic. This is God saying He wants the credit and the blame for everything that is going to happen. He is going to do this and He will visit the His Egypt and destroy the firstborn in every household… UNLESS…. He sees blood. If He sees the blood on the doorposts, on the lintel, covering, protecting the entrance of your home, He will Passover that home and that house will not see destruction on this night. If the last thing a household saw was the RED of blood on their doorway, the first thing God sees when He visits a house is RED. God notices. He knows. He sees it. He doesn't send someone to see it for Him. He personally checks. And when He sees RED, He passes by without fail. Every house where He sees red is safe. Every house where He doesn't see red on the doorway will see red by morning. Every house will see blood on this night. For those cowering in the corner with blood splattered clothes from painting their doorways to those whose firstborn are slaughtered for their faithless, stubborn failure to heed the warning. Blood will be everywhere in Egypt on this night. Everyone's lives will be defined by the blood of this night. Remember God came at midnight. That is the middle of the night. I usually go to bed around midnight, which is the beginning of the night in some ways in our head, but this is a culture where you go to bed once there is no natural light left, so 12pm is about halfway through the typical day's darkness.
VS 14-20 you shall remember this. You will put into place mechanisms to remind you specifically of what I did here and how those of you who believed were spared, how the blood saves, how God Passover those He visited who by faith hid themselves behind the blood.
VS 26-27 your children will inevitably ask why you observe such a peculiar discipline? You are not like everyone else. You are in this world, but you are different than the world. Why is that? What's the significance? We MUST be prepared to answer that question. We must ACT in a faithful way which will PROMPT the question and then be prepared in that moment to respond to the inquiry. The first generation believes, the next assumes, the last abandons because there is no rhyme or reason left behind the ceremonies.
29-32 God does exactly what He said He would do. He kills the firstborn of every household where He does not see the blood and He spares every household whose entryway is guarded by the blood of the spotless lamb.
VS 33 Pharaoh, as God predicted, now wants nothing to do with Israel and wants to send them out. But God grants favor to the Israelites. He also grants some Egyptians in lieu of this tragedy to be moved to a place of belief. They were the citizens of Egypt when it experienced the most difficult thing their county would ever endure and it moved their hardened, calloused hearts to belief. They gave Israel everything AND
VS 38 many of them joined the exodus out of Egypt. They choose the God who rained down destruction and repented. A MIXED MULTITUDE left Egypt that early morning. God had made Himself known and He had softened the hearts of some even amongst those most powerfully wounded by His coming.
"The same sun that softens the wax, hardens the clay."
VS 40-42 this night after 430 years of being homeless, God delivered Israel out of Egypt. This night is to be commemorated and remembered by all forever and ever.
Why is it so important to remember the significance of Jesus’ sacrifice?
Revelation 6:15-17
15 Then the kings of the earth and the great ones and the generals and the rich and the powerful, and everyone, slave and free, hid themselves in the caves and among the rocks of the mountains, 16 calling to the mountains and rocks, “Fall on us and hide us from the face of him who is seated on the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb, 17 for the great day of their wrath has come, and who can stand?”
15 Then the kings of the earth and the great ones and the generals and the rich and the powerful, and everyone, slave and free, hid themselves in the caves and among the rocks of the mountains, 16 calling to the mountains and rocks, “Fall on us and hide us from the face of him who is seated on the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb, 17 for the great day of their wrath has come, and who can stand?”
Revelation 14:9-10
9 And another angel, a third, followed them, saying with a loud voice, “If anyone worships the beast and its image and receives a mark on his forehead or on his hand, 10 he also will drink the wine of God's wrath, poured full strength into the cup of his anger, and he will be tormented with fire and sulfur in the presence of the holy angels and in the presence of the Lamb.
9 And another angel, a third, followed them, saying with a loud voice, “If anyone worships the beast and its image and receives a mark on his forehead or on his hand, 10 he also will drink the wine of God's wrath, poured full strength into the cup of his anger, and he will be tormented with fire and sulfur in the presence of the holy angels and in the presence of the Lamb.
Satan doesn’t rule over Hell as a booby prize after failing to conquer Heaven. He is there against his will. He is being tormented there. The Lamb rules over Hell. He presides over it. Hell is not the absence of God, it is the presence of His vengeance. God tells us not to take revenge because vengeance is Mine sayeth the Lord. Hell is where the slow wick of His grace and patience has burned completely out and all that is left is the terrifying presence of the everlasting explosion of fury. Our God is a consuming fire.
But Jesus died so that you could avoid that fate. The Lamb of God laid down His life so that those who believe in Him may experience an eternity of grace and hope and glory. It cost Him everything. He emptied Himself. He was abused, mocked, beaten, spit upon, tortured, and murdered by those who hated Him and abandoned by those who loved Him. So when people forget what He did or treat it like something insignificant, His fury burns.
STORY
John Griffith was in his early twenties—newly married and full of optimism. He and his lovely wife had been blessed with a beautiful, blue-eyed baby, that they named Gregory. The stock market crashed in 1929 and they made their way to Missouri, to the edge of the Mississippi River, and there he found a job tending one of the great railroad bridges that spanned the massive river. Every day John sat in a control room and directed the enormous gears of the immense bridge.
By 1937 his son Greg was 8 years old, and on April 5, 1937, for the first time, John brought Greg to work with him. Excitedly they packed their lunches and headed off toward the immense bridge.
Greg looked on in wide-eyed amazement as his dad pressed down the huge lever that raised and lowered the vast bridge. Soon, noon arrived. After John elevated the bridge and allowed some scheduled ships to pass through, he took his son by the hand, and they headed off for lunch. They inched their way down the narrow catwalk and out onto the observation deck that projected some 50 feet out over the majestic Mississippi. There they sat and watched spellbound as the ships passed by below.
Suddenly, they were startled by the shrieking whistle of a distant train. He quickly looked at his watch and saw that it was time for the 1:07, the Memphis Express, with 400 passengers, which would be rushing across that bridge in just a couple of minutes. He had just enough time.
He instructed his son to stay put. Quickly leaping to his feet, he jumped onto the catwalk and climbed the steel ladder leading into the control house.
Once in, he searched the river to make sure no ships were in sight. And then as he had been trained to do, he looked straight down beneath the bridge to make certain nothing was below. It was then he spied something so horrifying that his heart froze in his chest. For there, below him in the massive gear box that moved the bridge was his son.
Apparently Greg had tried to follow his dad but had fallen off the catwalk. Even now he was wedged between the teeth of two main cogs in the gear box. Although he appeared to be conscious, John could see that his son’s leg was bleeding. Then an even more horrifying thought flashed through his mind. For in that instant he knew that lowering the bridge meant killing his son.
His eyes filled with tears of panic. His mind whirled. What could he do? In his frantic search he spied a rope in the control room. He would rush down the ladder and out the catwalk, tie off the rope, lower himself down, extricate his son, climb back up the rope, run back into the control room, and lower the bridge. But even as he thought this he knew the horrible truth: there was just not enough time. He’d never make it.
Suddenly he heard the whistle again, this time much closer. The clicking of the locomotive wheels on the track beat out their cadence of doom. He heard the puff puff puff of the train with its 400 passengers. How could he sacrifice his son? His mother—he could see her tear stained face now. This was their only child, their beloved son. How could he. . . .
But he had no choice. He knew what he had to do, so with terror on his face he buried his head under his left arm and pushed the gear forward. The cries of his son were quickly drowned out by the relentless sound of the bridge as it ground slowly into position. With only seconds to spare, the Memphis Express roared out of the trees and over the mighty bridge.
John Griffith lifted his tear stained face and looked into the windows of the passing train. A businessman was reading the newspaper. A uniformed conductor was glancing nonchalantly at his large vest pocket watch. Ladies were sipping their afternoon tea in the dining cars. A small boy, looking strangely like his own son, Greg, pushed a long thin spoon into a large dish of ice cream. Many of the passengers seemed to be in either idle conversation or careless laughter. But no one looked his way. No one even cast a glance at the giant gear box that housed the mangled remains of his blue eyed boy.
In anguish he pounded the glass in the control room and cried out, “What’s the matter with you people? Don’t you care? Don’t you know what I’ve sacrificed for you? Doesn’t anyone care?” No one heard. And soon the disappearing train had vanished over the horizon.
Many of you are like those on that train. A great sacrifice has been made in order to save your lives and you remain caught up in the ordinary business of business as usual. You either pay no attention to what has been done for you or you often forget about it and find yourself distracted by things like facebook.
See God in that control booth, His Son beaten so badly that His lifeless body hangs unrecognizable on a bloody cross. Hear God pounding on the glass control room window and as He looks down on you this morning screaming, “What’s the matter with you people? Don’t you care? Don’t you know what I’ve sacrificed for you?! Doesn’t anyone care?!?!?!?”
1 Corinthians 11:23-25
23 For I received from the Lord what I also delivered to you, that the Lord Jesus on the night when he was betrayed took bread, 24 and when he had given thanks, he broke it, and said, “This is my body, which is for you. Do this in remembrance of me.” 25 In the same way also he took the cup, after supper, saying, “This cup is the new covenant in my blood. Do this, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of me.” 26 For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord's death until he comes.
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