Dr. John Oswalt, Exodus, Session 3, Exodus 5-6

[Music] [Applause] this is dr. John Oswalt and his teaching on the book of Exodus this is session number three Exodus chapters five and six let's begin with prayer father we rejoice in you you are the cause of joy if you were not there would be no joy in the world this would simply be a dog-eat-dog place survival of the fittest at all costs chance ruling everything thank you that that's not so thank you that you are our Father that you care about everything we care about you're interested in everything we're interested in thank you Lord that you love us so passionately it breaks your heart when we sin and go astray and yet Lord you don't cast us off you reach out to us again and again and we thank you that's cause for joy so we thank you this evening for this opportunity to be together around your word we thank you for the mutual stimulation we receive as together we share and think and talk and we pray that that will happen again this evening as we look at this portion of Scripture Oh Lord open it to us not simply so that we can have our minds titillated with new information but that your Holy Spirit might have deeper access into our hearts to change our lives for the sake of a lost world in your name we pray amen all right last week I left out one point as we got toward the end and that's the point on the hardening of Pharaoh's heart when I travel around oftentimes I have a question-and-answer session usually there are two questions that come up the hardening of Pharaoh's heart and the slaughter of the Canaanites all the other questions are easy so what about the hardening of Pharaoh's heart well first of all remember Pharaoh was not a nice man Pharaoh was not a friendly fella who could be easily convinced to do the right thing Pharaoh considered himself to be God from the moment when he was old enough to understand anything he was treated as God his way was law so far we have not discovered any law codes in Egypt you have them in Mesopotamia the famous one that many of us learned about in high school Hammurabi's code and there are four or five other ones from Mesopotamia there are no law codes from Egypt and the presumption is because the Pharaoh made it up as he went he was God and whatever he said today was law and whatever he said tomorrow was law so this is not a nice man this is a military dictator who thinks he is God and he's determined to have his own way so it's not a case of this nice man saying oh wouldn't it be nice to let the Hebrews go and God says no that's not what we're talking about you'll notice if you looked at the references that are there that actually three different things are said first of all there's the statement I that is God will harden his heart but also in chapter 8 verses 15 and 32 it simply said Pharaoh's heart was hard it's just a fact and then there are also excuse me see any this this was gonna change references here there are four references for this one chapter 7 verses 13 and 22 chapter 8 verse 19 and 9 7 and 35 so five times were simply told his heart was hard it was a hard-hearted man and then there are two that I think are very significant 815 and 32 where it says Pharaoh hardened his heart so again we're not talking about God doing something to this man against his will why is he unwilling to let these people go well really there are two reasons one we see in chapter 14 if you look over there chapter 14 verse 5 when the king of Egypt was told that the people had fled Pharaoh and his officials changed their minds about them and said what have we done we have let the Israelites go and lost their services so there's one reason that he hardens his heart because it'll be too expensive but there is another reason that Pharaoh hardens his heart and that is nobody tells me what to do there's a sense in which Yahweh is saying to Moses my command to let these people go is going to harden his heart so what we have is a man who believes himself to be God a man who believes that he can do anything he pleases anytime he wants to and God says something is going to happen to this guy he's going to be put in a position where he's going to discover he doesn't have absolute freedom to do whatever he wants to do why because God won't let him no no because all his life he has made up his mind that he is going to do what he wants and this now moves him into a position where he no longer has freedom of choice some of you here are too young to know this others of us are old enough to know it do something long enough and you don't have the freedom to do anything else I meet students who have never ever done anything extra outside of class and they say Oh prof this class I'm gonna do it and I say to myself good luck honey they have chosen away and they think they have freedom but they no longer have freedom and so it is here with the Pharaoh God has made the world in such a way that we become fixed in our choices and we don't have the freedom any longer to do anything else this man doesn't have the freedom to generously let people go even if he would want to and he doesn't want to he doesn't have the freedom anymore so what I'm saying is this process is much more complex than God hardened Pharaoh's heart sounds was Pharaohs heart hard because of God's actions yes but did God hardened Pharaoh's heart against his own will never never Pharaoh was doing what he wanted to do as a result of what he had chosen to be for his whole life okay questions new comments before we leave that how old would Farrell have been well there we don't know who the favor was exactly but presumably he's in his voice but we really don't know as we said last week these midwives are named the Pharaoh is not anything else okay last chance in Chapter five Moses having gotten the approval of the people they're very excited they're at the end of chapter four God has heard our cry and they bowed down and worshiped that's where the fourth chapter ended now they go to Pharaoh this is what Yahweh the God of Israel says let my people go so that they may hold a festival to me in the wilderness now was that deceptive it's it's let my people go so that they can get out of here and go to the promised land now I don't know whether you've read ahead or not but in the next five plagues every one of them Moses says let my people go that they may go and worship me in the wilderness so I'm asking what do you think is that is that deception exactly exactly they were going to worship Him this relates to what we talked about two weeks ago about the purpose of the book why did God get the people out of Egypt so that they could know who he is and so that he could come home the Promised Land is gravy so no this is not deceptive in the least this is precisely why they are being delivered so that they can go into the wilderness and worship the one God who is God and in that worship experience what all of us were made for and incidentally they could go on to the promised land so this is quite significant okay that's that's in the background for next week and it would but it's fine Pharaoh understands three days will take them beyond the border of Egypt if they go three days into the wilderness to worship God they're out of here and that's why we'll see in next week study he tries to bargain so yes he knows if they go into the wilderness to worship a three-day journey they won't be coming back but it's interesting it isn't let my people go because they deserve freedom it isn't let my people go because they've been oppressed too long let my people go that they may go and worship Me now this is a little political but what has happened in America is we have come to worship freedom and it's killing us we were made to worship God does God hate oppression absolutely does God hate Human Bondage absolutely but he's got something more in mind for us than merely released from bondage and that's a very very significant issue in this book chapter 5 verse 2 look at that question and remember you you've got to keep in your mind all the way through here every time you see L o our D that equals Yahweh what is Pharaoh saying read it somebody verse 2 yes yes what is the real question here is who is this Yahweh who is this guy who dares to send a bunch of hairy bearded Semites in here and tell me to let them go I don't know any Yahweh I'm gonna let me go either so what's the purpose of the plagues God's sovereignty to teach Pharaoh who Yahweh really is if getting the people out of Egypt were what it was all about then one big plague would have done it boom they're out of here but the issue is who is Yahweh and that's gonna be the theme running through here again we're gonna see this especially in the study next week what's the connection between knowing Yahweh and obeying him I don't know him and I'm not gonna let you go what's the connection between knowing Yahweh and obeying him what does it mean if I won't obey Him I don't know him I don't know the one who is the I am who is the source of all that exists I don't know the one who has made the world with the snap of his fingers if I stand on my hind legs and say no that's a pretty clear sign I don't know who I'm talking to and yet and yet we do it and he allows it he doesn't say you had one chance and that was it no no over and over and over and over again who is yahweh gracious slow to anger full of kindness we read the Old Testament and we see this God who was bad but we forget he's mad after about eighty seven thousand good reasons to get mad okay so what does Pharaoh think about the sincerity of their requests let's verse four and five tell us have they really heard from some God what's he saying four and five what's it say they just went out of work they made this up yeah there is no Yahweh you made him up I never heard of him so if I've never heard of him he doesn't exist you made this all up what does that say about how secular people understand some of our spiritual concerns they don't know God therefore he doesn't exist we're making it up for our own personal ends it's just a crutch it's foolishness yes yes so we shouldn't be surprised if the secular world doesn't think for a moment that we're sincere you can't be sincere there is no God they would have to answer to one yes and that's a very unpleasant thought so know it but again I think it really is important for us to sort of get it through our heads that it's not a question of well we don't really like the God that you're you're talking about we we agree that he exists but we don't quite know I don't know any Yahweh therefore there isn't one that's true - that's true - all right so he gives the famous order mud bricks have to have some sort of a binder to hold them together while they're drying in the Sun many parts of the world use seashells for that task Egypt typically used straw as the binder to hold it together and they had been given straw and now they're not going to be given straw anymore they got to go get their own verses 15 to 21 what did the overseers not do they didn't cry out to God you have the feeling they didn't know Yahweh either or if they did he was not a critical part of their lives so they go to Pharaoh the oppressor and try to get relief and they don't get any relief and he says no way so verse 20 when they left Pharaoh they found Moses and Aaron waiting to meet them and they said now this is where I lost a vote in the New Living Translation committee I knew I would but I wanted to get it on the floor anyhow a really contemporary version would say god damn you that's what they said you know NIV is very very nice may the Lord look on you and judge you yeah why do they blame Moses and Aaron they made it all up yes yes I think you're exactly right yep yeah I think you're exactly right thank you exactly right and isn't it interesting let's let's push it back a little farther what did Moses and Aaron do that got them in trouble they obeyed God and and did what yes this this if if Moses and Aaron had just stayed away and not riled up Pharaoh everything would have been nice yes exactly we would rather live in our bondage than face the challenges that are involved in being delivered from our bondage exactly exactly God is going to come with a couple of big helicopters and get us right out of here and it's not going to cost us anything and it's not going to hurt anything this is what often happens in salvation preaching now I'm a preacher I can talk except Jesus and you'll have no more trouble the fact is you accept Jesus and the trouble is just beginning when you're laying down in the bottom of the trench and not causing the enemy any anxiety life can be pretty easy but just step up on the firing step and start waving the Jesus flag and guess what there's gonna be incoming incoming fire aimed at you and in our salvation preaching yes we need to say to people accept Christ and there will be deliverance from your problems who are your difficulties but but deliverance may come through increased problems and increase difficulty that's what these guys were not ready for if if if if going into the wilderness to worship God is going to involve making more bricks forget it if everything will be easy yes God you can have your way in my life but if it's going to be difficult if it's going to involve pain if it's gonna involve struggle got me out Tommy I don't want to go there yes they were not willing to be held accountable for what might be involved here so you have made us stink to Pharaoh and his officials and you put a sword in their hand to kill us so how does Moses respond verse 22 did you send me to bring trouble on these people Farrow questioned Yahweh's identity what does Moses question his motive his goodness now in the background there I comment on I've said this lots of times and you'll hear it lots more if you stick it out here with me Hebrew has a very small vocabulary and that means that most words have big big pools of meaning so there is this word rah I think it's very appropriate sounding ah this is a rough guttural it is often translated evil and that's a good translation but it means lots of other things all the way down to trouble I've said to students a good deal that probably the closest English word is bad Hitler was a bad man I'm having a bad day Oh a morally evil day huh no no just one that is filled with difficulty but the use of the word here I think is very interesting God you're causing these people trouble [Music] are you a good god did you really send me here to make their oppression worse what kind of a God are you anyhow I don't know about you but I've been there wait a minute God wait a minute are you really good when you even if you didn't cause that you let it happen heard about a couple today in the ministry who have had their second house burning in two months now I don't know whether people in their congregation have it in for them or you know John Wesley's father they got their parson he's burned out from under them and John Wesley barely escaped with his life because the congregation were sick and tired of this preacher but there's the issue so the offer of deliverance has actually made the situation worse why did God permit that yeah and Ruth says testing they didn't have enough despair yet look at chapter six verse one what does God say now you will see what I will do is God does God have enough freedom in my life to bring hardship if that will make his grace more evident if they had just walked out of there we would know a great deal less about Yahweh than we know now you will see does God have the freedom to bring hardship into my life trouble into my life in order that who he really is may be made more evident to a watching world yeah yeah yeah yeah but so often the goal of my life is not to reveal Christ in all his fullness to the world the goal of my life is comfort ease and pleasure and God I like that name it and claim it theology or as someone else said blab it and grab it yes I want a God who will take care of me and supply my needs and do what I want which is called idolatry can I in genuine trust in His goodness that my life go into his hands for him to do with as he will in order that he may be known in a lost world these deep questions okay let's push on chapter 6 verses 1 to 8 we've talked about this already question 1 verse 3 is is one that has caused a lot of scholarly interest across the years God said to Moses I am Yahweh I appeared to Abraham to Isaac and to Jacob as God Almighty but by my name Yahweh I did not make myself fully known to them but there's a problem with that because Yahweh show the name shows up in Genesis shows up quite a bit it shows up at some interesting points one of the most interesting to me is in Genesis chapter 22 turn back there please Genesis 22 I want you to look sometime later what verse 1 God tested Abraham verse 2 then God said verse 3 when he had cut enough wood for the burnt offering he set out for the place God had told him about on down to verse 8 Isaac has asked where the lamb is Abraham answered God Himself will provide the lamb for the burnt offering verse 9 when they reached the place God had told him about so it's been God God God God now verse 11 but the angel of Yahweh called out to him from heaven verse 12 now I know you fear God so Abraham verse 14 called that place Yahweh will provide to this day on the mountain of Yahweh it will be provided verse 16 I swear by myself declares Yahweh and that interesting up to the moment of sacrifice it's God now I think there are two possible solutions to Exodus 6:3 one is no they did not know the label Yahweh until the time of Moses and Moses then in causing the I suspect oral traditions that had been passed down of Genesis causing them to be written Moses has said hey this is Yahweh in action here Abraham didn't call him that Abraham called him in the mountain of God it will be provided but Moses is saying huh that's Yahweh that I've come to know that's one possibility that in fact they did not know the label yet but there's another possibility and that relates to what we've talked about a number of times before name in the Old Testament is much more than label name is character reputation so I think it's possible that they knew the label but they did not know his name they didn't know that he is the covenant keeping God in the sense that they were to know it they did not know that he's the tabernacling God in the sense that they were to know it they did not know that he is the creator in the sense that they were to know it so that's the other possibility and I think you as the man said you pays you money and takes you choice as to what's going on here my if I had to put my neck on the block I would come down on this side and say yes I think they didn't know the label but I don't think they knew him as they were to come to know him and part and part of my reason for that is the thing that we're gonna run into intense them intensely here is this thing then you will know you don't know now you haven't experienced yet Who I am and what I'm like and while I'm gonna but you're going to so I would tend to come down on that side but that's one of those questions for heaven okay anyway it's the the scholars have just gone wild over this over the years arguing that there were two different books there was a Yahweh book and an Elohim book with Elohim as God and that at some point somebody took scissors to them and cut them apart and pasted them together again and that that theory pretty well ruled Old Testament studies for the last hundred and fifty years and it's still around you don't believe God inspired it then it's hard to find a better answer than that one okay number three what is God going to reveal about his nature and character according to chapter six verse one all right the power of God because of my mighty hand he will let them go because of my mighty hand he will drive them out of this country you're going to discover something about the power of the I am before this is all over all right in verses 2 & 3 what are they going to learn about the character of God what does verse 3 say I did what I appeared they're going to understand that he is the revealing God who keeps his promises Abraham Isaac and Jacob have been dead 300 years by now I made a promise to your father's about land about progeny about being blessing to the world you're going to see that I keep my promises Wow what's he going to reveal about himself in verses 4 & 5 he is a covenant-keeping god why What's it saying verse 5 I have what heard the groaning yes he's covenant-keeping because he is caring this is not just a legal deal yeah I made a promise to those people back there and I guess I got to keep it anyhow don't want to but I have to know I made a promise to their ancestor and how can I stand by and listen to their cries and groaning and not do something about it what about verse 7 what's he going to reveal about himself there I'll do what I will take you as my own people and I will be your God a God of relational love and this you will be my people and I will be your God runs through the Old Testament as a thread I'll give myself to you I am the I am I'm the source of all that is but I'll give myself to you now that's especially poignant for me because of having spent so much of my life poring over Isaiah how good god is but that phrase that is characteristic of Isaiah the Holy One absolutely transcendent absolutely other unlike anything else in the cosmos who gives himself freely do a very undeserving bunch of people like us what a god verse age what's he revealing about himself there we've seen it here he keeps his promises he keeps his covenant he is faithful trustworthy god did you send me here to do evil to these people no Moses but now because of this much more difficult situation you're going to see some things about me that you wouldn't have known otherwise is that alright Moses so what happens verse 9 Moses reported this to the Israelites and they said oh thank god no they did not listen to him oh they listened a couple of weeks ago when Moses and Aaron showed up with the rod that turns into a snake in the hand that becomes leprous and becomes clean oh yeah they thought that was cool but now no no this is gonna hurt we're discouraged or broken we're not going to give God a chance and God understands that so the Lord said to Moses go tell Pharaoh king of Egypt to let the Israelites go out of his country and Moses said yes sir if the Israelites won't listen to me why would Pharaoh listen to me especially God remember I can't talk unclean lips mm-hmm yes Ruth is pointing out that what Moses says literally verse 12 is since I speak with uncircumcised lips and again the commentators are all over the map as to exactly what he means there I'm reading the NIV here and it says faltering lips but Ruth's point is a good one uncircumcised unclean is Moses understanding some things about his own character and his own nature that has to be dealt with I think it's very probable uh-huh uh-huh that's no you're you're exactly right the literal Hebrew is uncircumcised lips do we have some other translations here what are some other renderings of this unskilled speech any others clumsy speaker mm-hmm mm-hmm so as I say that the commentators struggle with exactly what this implies but I think the idea of uncleanness is certainly one that's got to be given a good deal of attention yeah I think I think it's very possible the only thing that worries me about it is there is no place where that gets taken care of that in in Isaiah the coal touches his lips and they're clean you don't have that here and that's one one complicating factor it's possible possible possible but again we have to wait till heaven I think to get the answer on that yes the question is with Moses training as the son of Pharaoh couldn't we expect him to be a fairly polished speaker and I think the answer is yes I think again as back in Chapter four we saw last time he's just he's just looking for excuses okay I want to push on here our time is just about up now we come to this genealogy the Lord spoke to Moses and Aaron about the Israelites and Pharaoh king of Egypt he commanded them to bring the Israelites up out of Egypt we know that and then comes this list and in particular the list beginning in verse nineteen focuses on Levi mm-hmm Amram married his sister his father's sister jock Abed now this is one of the reasons I think they knew the name before chapter six verse three because the Jo is a short form for Yahweh his mother's name means Yahweh is glorious so we wonder what's going on especially when it's sandwiched between verses 10 11 and 12 and verses 28 29 30 the Lord spoke to Moses in Egypt he said to him I'm the Lord tell Pharaoh king of Egypt everything I tell you Moses said to the Lord since I speak with uncircumcised lips why would Pharaoh listen to me that's what we just had so what's this genealogy doing between those two for seminary students among us that's inclusio envelope when we've got the two statements that are essentially the same not exactly the same and I'm going to ask you about that next week but essentially the same and in between is this genealogy what are your thoughts what's the genealogy doing there all right it's establishing the line of the priesthood why is that important at this point [Music] all right all right this comes back to this worship thing doesn't it why is God getting them out of Egypt the worship and the fact that they are of that family that's going to be assigned to lead the worship I think it's quite significant and so you notice what verse 26 says it was this Aaron and Moses to whom the Lord said bring the Israelites out of Egypt by their division they were the ones who spoke to Pharaoh king of Egypt about bringing the Israelites out of Egypt this same Moses and Aaron so yes I think that's exactly what's going on you are establishing these are not just johnny-come-lately these are not just somebody that God drew out of a hat I need somebody to get my people out don't like that one exactly exactly exactly God is at work and these two guys for all of their difficulties and it's interesting to me as far as I know now I could be proven wrong it's happened at least once before in my life maybe even twice as far as I can see nothing good is ever said about Aaron but he is the chosen high priest my guess is the Bible doesn't say anything good about him because it wants to depict the true high priest in all his perfect purity I think that's what's going on but anyway the Bible is saying in spite of these guys and their difficulties and their from certain perspectives inadequacies these are the ones God chose to accomplish his purposes and that says to me God can use us God doesn't have you where you are by accident now I don't believe in determinism I don't believe that a billion years ago God wrote out a list and said let's see on Monday night February 20th 2012 at 801 Oswald will be in the FAs building in Wilmore Kentucky don't think so don't think so however I do believe that God in His infinite creativity and wisdom has you and me if we're obedient where he can use us to accomplish his good purposes nothing is by accident that's why I don't believe in evolution because evolution says that everything that happens is a result of chance now I happen to believe that the world has been here a long long time I don't think it was created 6,000 years ago I don't think you have to believe that to be faithful to the Scriptures but I think you've got to be faithful to the Scriptures and say that none of it is the result of chance that God has been directing every step of the and that's good news let's pray thank you Father thank you that you can use the Moses in an errand thank you that you have your hand upon our lives for good thank you Lord that in the hard places when things are going wrong but it just seems as though you've let things get out of control we nevertheless can believe you that you are in control and you're faithful and you're going to use every event for the greatest good if we'll let you we want to know you Lord we confess that we'd like to know you through pleasant easy ways but if it takes hard ways then yes we want to know you in your name we pray amen thanks so much [Music] [Applause] this is dr. John Oswalt and his teaching on the book of Exodus this is session number three Exodus chapters five and six [Music]

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Keywords: Exodus, Exodus 5-6, John Oswalt, Francis Asbury Society, biblicalelearning.org, Ted Hildebrandt

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Length: 64min 48sec (3888 seconds)

Published: Sat Sep 22 2018