WHO IS GOD?

Many worshippers claim God's name, but they can't all be right because they're so different.

America's tolerant society teaches us to elevate all faiths to an equal playing field.  Such egalitarianism inflates our pride of open-mindedness, but is that what God says?

Who is God?  The LORD tells us in ancient Egypt, defining Himself as He does battle with Pharaoh and the gods of Egypt.


THE PLOT
God gives the nation of Israel an assignment to make Him known in the pagan world and Moses is the point man.

This is larger than a Cecil B. DeMille story about Pharaoh and Moses.  Yahweh is declaring Himself to be God over the little gods.  And He accomplishes the evidence by using the pagans AND their demonic power to prove who He is.

THE PLAYERS
In one corner are two eighties-something poor Hebrew slaves carrying only a shepherd's staff.  In the opposite corner stands Pharaoh, the rich and educated king of the whole world, carrying the importance of being thought to be the reincarnation of the sun god, Ra.

The battle doesn't sound too promising, does it?  It's reminiscent of the time God had Elijah pour water on the wood before He lit it.  Jehovah wants everyone to understand that the power and glory are all His.

THE NARRATIVE
The story is familiar.  God and Pharaoh go head-to-head around three areas of Egyptian worship.  Egypt had about 80 different "nature gods", but the plagues squared off against the most prominent (two river gods, four land gods, and three sky gods).

Each time Moses and Aaron go into the Pharaoh's presence, God is giving  the ruler a chance to know Him.  However, the Pharaoh progressively hardens his own heart until finally, God hardens Pharaoh's heart.  In between, there is much razzle-dazzle as the supernatural powers fly.

GOD'S POWER (over the two river gods)
The first battle salvo was eye-catching.  When the Nile turned to blood, desert people would take notice of the lack of drinking water and crop irrigation.  God was saying to the people..."You pray to the god of the river, but I am the Living Water.  Where is the river god that you think protects you?"  Their sorcerers took note that they could duplicate the phenomenon, but could not reverse it.
And Pharaoh hardened his heart.

After the blood had killed the living things in the water, God caused a malignant number of frogs to appear from the river.  Again, the priests of Pharaoh could duplicate with more frogs, but couldn't remove the frogs.  And since the people worshipped a god with a frog's head, they couldn't very well kill the frogs; that would be like an Indian killing a cow.  Pharaoh begged Moses to take the frogs away, but Pharaoh didn't change his heart.

GOD'S POWER (over the four land gods)
Moses was told to tell Aaron to strike the dust of the ground and all the dust of Egypt became lice/gnats.  God was showing His sovereignty over all of the ground.  Remember, we were made from that dust and so His rule extends over us.  But Pharaoh hardened his heart.

After the gnats came the dogflies, bloodsuckers more damaging than gnats flying up your nose.  This plague affected Egyptians, but not Israelites.  Here the LORD begins to make a redemptive distinction between His people and demon worship.  Beelzebub was known as the Lord of the Flies (or Satan) and Egyptians called on him as an insurance policy to protect them.  But even in Beelzebub's own territory (flies), the "Lord of the Flies" was impotent.  God took away the flies, but Pharaoh hardened his heart.

The third challenge to the land gods again only affected Egyptians.  God sent an infectious disease which may have been like mad cow.  When it destroyed livestock, it hit Egypt's economy because people measured wealth in the number of their livestock.  The worship of Isis (the queen of the gods who sometimes was pictured with cow horns on her head)...and Egypt's other bovine worship...was an affront to the LORD.  The bulls were signs of strength and fertility, and were used as sacrifices in their worship.  No wonder when Moses came down from the mountain and found the Israelites around the golden calf, he threw down the tablets. God saves those who put all other "gods" away.  Idols can be anything from filling your mind with  something other than God...to worshipping a false understanding of God.

When Pharaoh doesn't respond to the destruction of livestock, the severity of consequences are ratcheted up.  We take note that a nation's leader can inflict great damage on his people as we watch Pharaoh's choice result in itchy boils full of puss all over the Egyptians' bodies.  Again, Israel was spared.  Egyptians were known all around the world for their advanced medical knowledge, but it wasn't helping them now.  Think that didn't humiliate Pharaoh's personal physician...and the priests who couldn't even come before Pharaoh because their boils defiled them?  With THIS plague, God hardens Pharaoh's heart.

GOD'S POWER (over the three sky gods)
Today in Egypt, Cairo only receives about two inches of rain annually so the next plague would have been an attention-grabber.  The Lord filled the skies with clouds that brought hail and lightning and thunder.  The hail beat down everything in the fields and stripped every tree everywhere except in the land of Goshen where the Israelites lived.  This time, God told Moses to warn the people of the coming destruction.  Some believed and moved themselves and their cattle into shelters.  Pharaoh's response?  He made a "sort-of" confession, but his heart was not changed.  Again, he hardened his heart.

Then Moses stretched out his hand and the LORD sent a strong east wind that blew locusts in from the Arabian desert.  They ate everything that was left in the fields after the hail; there would be no harvest in Egypt that year.  Now the officials at court begged Pharaoh to let the Israelites go.  They knew the grain god (Nepri) and the guardian of the fields (Anubis) and the deity of the harvest (Min) could not help them.  But still Pharaoh would not let God's people go.

The ninth plague had to do with darkness so complete that it could be felt.  Their choice to live in darkness had been fulfilled in darkness.  But the light that was on in Goshen should have made things pretty obvious.  Egyptians worshipped the sun (Ra) and moon (Heliopolis) and the Pharaoh himself.  Now it's really in Pharaoh's wheelhouse.  Pharaoh offers a compromise, but God does not compromise.  Have you ever tried to cut a deal with Him?

THE TENTH PLAGUE
In the death of the firstborns, God  demonstrates His character traits of justice and mercy.  While all men are sinners who earn their wage of death, God gives unmerited favor to some.  One group (called Egyptians) received JUSTICE for their sins because they trusted idols in the face of great evidence to the contrary.  The other group (called Israelites) were shown MERCY for their sins as they were given instructions on how to trust God's sacrificial way to cover sin.

Both groups are an illustrated picture book for us.  Will we humble ourselves and trust God to instruct us?  In faith, the Israelites applied blood to the doorpost of their homes and the death angel passed over their home.  Sadly, there was loud wailing in Egyptian homes as death visited each house.  With this great personal cost, Pharaoh finally relented and let the Israelites go.

CONCLUSIONS
1.  All worship is not equal.  The Bible was written that we might know who God is and what He expects.  He presented Himself to the Egyptians THEN and He presents Himself to the whole world NOW as we read this big story of salvation.  God said "By this you will know that I am the LORD."

2.  Who are these gods of Egypt?  There are two supernatural forces in the world; God says that if worship is not of Him, it is demonic.  The Bible calls the priests of Egypt "sorcerers" and their magic arts were limited.  God is more powerful than Satan and He says "there is none like Me in all the earth".

3.  This story was really over at the beginning when Aaron's rod swallowed up the sorcerer's rods.  All that lacked then was for the details to be played out.  But the Book says when Pharaoh observed that powerful demonstration of God's power, he left the room uninterested.  With some people, no amount of evidence will sway them.

4.  Did you know that in the end times, the LORD will send similar plagues?   In the first bowl judgment, He will inflict painful sores on those with the mark of the beast that sound much like the boils of the 7th plague.  And in Revelation 16, it says "Great hailstones, about one hundred pounds each, fell from heaven on people; and they cursed God for the plague of the hail, because the plague was so severe."

5.  Egyptians were very religious people, worshipping everything around them.  God came to call them to true worship, proving He was greater than all their gods.  We can take note that it is dangerous to harden your heart.

6.  By the time Israel left Egypt, both sides had a clear picture of God's power and protection and plan.  And surely all those who lived in the surrounding nations had also heard the story as the knowledge of God spread.  Not all in Egypt believed, but the Bible says the ones who did believe went along with Israel in the exodus.

So who is God?  He is MERCIFUL and MIGHTY, the One True God who graciously reveals Himself in His creation, His miracles, and in His Word.  Just as then the Israelites followed His instructions to deal with their sin by the blood of the lamb, now the blood of the Lamb deals with sin once and forever.

God has drawn a red line of expectation in the knowledge of Himself.  He wants us to worship the Creator, not the created.  His demand on Pharaoh's life to acknowledge Him as LORD is the same call He offers each man as He gives us an offer to deal with our sins.  It's a good offer.

DEATH: NOT THE PREFERRED OPTION

In 1989, my mother went in for a biopsy of a lump on her neck.  She took Philippians 4:6 with her into the procedure:  "BE ANXIOUS FOR NOTHING, BUT IN EVERYTHING BY PRAYER AND SUPPLICATION WITH THANKSGIVING LET YOUR REQUESTS BE MADE KNOWN TO GOD." 

Of course our family and friends were also letting our requests be known to God.  We asked for "benign" but Mother's answer came back "malignant" (non-Hodgkins lymphoma).  Then we turned to the verse which followed:  "AND THE PEACE OF GOD, WHICH SURPASSES ALL COMPREHENSION, SHALL GUARD YOUR HEARTS AND YOUR MINDS IN CHRIST JESUS." 

We knew the course was to be bumpy, but Mother knew the Lord promised to set a guard of peace over her heart and mind.  And part of that peace came in knowing the One who could just have easily made the lump harmless...was still working the plan that He had for her life.  She was to bring Him glory in the way she trusted Him...and she did.

Meanwhile, she would fight with all her might to live.  There was chemo, hair loss, and then the disease went into remission for an 18-month sigh of relief.  Another lump brought dread as we waited to see if the lymphoma had returned.  Again we prayed that the Lord would take it away.  He did not.

In the interim as Mother did what she called "couch duty"... our Tender Shepherd loved on Mother through countless expressions of concern from friends and neighbors.

Mother was sanguine and part of several different communities.  There were the parents of the toddlers she taught in church, BSF Children's Leaders, her church small cell group, friends from her hometown (Des Arc), the town where they raised their family (Jonesboro), and from Little Rock.  All those connections brought such loving offers of help and food and cards and visits.

But when the lights went out at night and Daddy was asleep, it was just Mother and the Lord.  Would she look past her circumstances to His promises?  We watched her grow sweeter as the days went by.  Her outer shell was dissipating, but her inner man gained strength.  And on the day that she died, the family encircled her, sang to her, read Scripture and prayed over her as we thanked the Lord for her life and the way she had loved us well.

Isn't it strange how we seem to fight coming into this world and going out, too?  In Mother's case, she was blessed to be able to live at home until just a hospital stay of one week.  But what about others who suffer prolonged pain and death?  Doctors can help and hospice is a wonderful blessing.  It is one thing to get help from pain, but another thing to intentionally end life.

It stands to reason that the God who gives us life with a purpose ALSO has a purpose in our death.  We watched many nurses and friends leave Mother's hospital room in tears as she lived her faith.  We saw 300+ people turn out for a celebration service that held God HIGH and included words explaining how to come to Him.

A person on their deathbed often has measured breath and we lean in to be sure we hear all they want to convey.  When all else fades away, the important things rise to the top.  What could be more important than how to find the road to heaven?  Mother was a great road sign.

Have you heard of the young woman named Brittany Maynard who is dying and has made public the day she will die?  She moved to Oregon and bought a pill to end her life.  That act takes her life into her hands, but the Book says it is HE who has made us and not we ourselves.  Our lives do not belong to us.

Hearts go out to Brittany as she faces death at only twenty-nine years old.  With so much on her plate, has she factored in what God has planned for her?  We don't know because she makes no mention of God.  Do any of us  know when our testimony is over?  And aren't there always surprises in medicine?

In Brittany's interviews, she comes across as very articulate and reasoned in her quest for "dignity".  But our dignity comes from being made in the image of God and in our commitment to His cause.  Perhaps this young woman's fears have pushed her away from trusting God.  Perhaps she does not know that possessing God's Son saves us from death.  If the latter, she will be leaving earth too soon.

Life is more than a bucket list or getting our way because life is not about us.  Life is knowing Jesus, who has bought our ticket and has gone ahead of us to prepare our place.  We go home at His bidding.