Sugar Land Bible Church

Dr. Andy Woods: And as our children are being dismissed to junior church, let's take our Bibles this morning and open them up to the book of Exodus chapter 10 and verse 16. The Lord willing, trying to cover verses 16 through 20 this morning. The title of our message this morning is Life and Death.

God, of course, in the book of Exodus is in the process of redeeming His elect nation, the nation of Israel, which had been in bondage to Egypt for 400 years. The instrument that God is using is Moses. What God is now working through Moses are the 10 plagues. We've covered six of them, almost seven after today. Excuse me, eight. We will have finished locusts after today, Lord willing.

We've seen the Nile turned to blood. We've seen frogs and gnats and flies and the death of livestock and boils and hail. We're in the process of studying the locust judgment. It's kind of an interesting judgment in the sense that there's a lot of conversations going on here. God gives instructions to Moses and Aaron concerning what they are to do and how they're to bring this judgment on Egypt.

Moses and Aaron speak to Pharaoh. Moses and Aaron speak to Pharaoh again. Then the last time we were in this, the plague manifested in verses 12 through 15. Now Pharaoh speaks to Moses and Aaron a third time. So, you see as Moses is now speaking to Pharaoh a third time along with Aaron, you see a summoning, a repentance, and a request. Notice the summoning in Exodus chapter 10 and verse 16. It says, "Then Pharaoh hurriedly called for Moses and Aaron."

Why is all of a sudden Pharaoh in a hurry? He wasn't in a hurry before when he talked to them the first time in verse three, not much of a hurry. He talked to them again beginning in verse eight, not much of a hurry. Well, now he's in a hurry because he's in trouble. The plague has come. We see a description of it in verse 14 and verse 15, and Pharaoh wants a way out.

He acts like he's repentant, but he's not. Look at verse 16. It says, "Then Pharaoh hurriedly called for Moses and Aaron and he said," and this is very good theology right here, by the way. He gets an A-plus for theology and an F for sincerity. Even Satan has good theology. Did you know that? Satan can rattle off all kinds of theological truths.

Then Pharaoh hurriedly called for Moses and Aaron and said, "I have sinned against the Lord your God and against you." We only wish he were sincere in that, but he's not because we'll be getting to verse 20, which will end this paragraph and end this judgment, where he will not let God's people go.

There are a lot of people like this in the world. They sort of say the right things. They feign some sort of contrition, but their hearts are not right with God. It reminds me of the prophet Isaiah, God speaking through the prophet Isaiah where God says, "These people draw near to me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me." Jesus is not looking for an outward sign from people or an outward sort of conformity. He's looking at the condition of the heart. He's always looking at the hearts of people.

When God called David back in 1 Samuel chapter 16 and verse seven, God told the prophet at the time, Samuel, concerning the selection of David, "Don't look at his appearance or at the height of his stature because I have rejected him," referring to Saul. "For God does not see as man sees, for man looks at the outer appearance, but the Lord looks at the heart."

There were a lot of people in the ministry of Christ that sort of superficially attached themselves to Jesus, but Jesus would not entrust himself to them. This is what we read in John 2, verses 23 through 25. It says, "Now when He was in Jerusalem at Passover during the feast, many believed in His name, observing His signs which He was doing. But Jesus, on His part, was not entrusting Himself to them." Why not? "For He knew all men and because He did not need anyone to testify concerning man, for He Himself knew what was in man."

If you've followed some of our teaching on that passage, we try to make the argument that those people were probably saved. They trusted in Christ alone for salvation, but they were not ready for discipleship. They were not ready for intimacy with God. They were not ready for friendship with God. We've spent other sermons developing that viewpoint and that position. My only point here in bringing this up is showing us that Jesus sees the heart. He sees what's inside of people.

How does the saying go? You can fool some of the people some of the time. How does it go? But you can't fool all of the people all of the time, something along those lines. The truth of the matter is you can't fool God. God, and this is why in the book of Revelation when Jesus is described in Revelation chapter one, His eyes of fire are depicted. He looks right into a person. He looks right into a person's heart. He looks right into a person's soul, and He can ascertain what is happening inside of people.

So, Pharaoh had all the right things to say. He had all the right doctrine to say. He passed the theology test, but the truth of the matter is he had no intention whatsoever of releasing God's people from Egyptian bondage. Pharaoh probably thought he was pulling one over on God, but you can't fool God. So, we see here repentance, but it's feigned. It's not real.

This leads to Pharaoh's request. You see that there in verse 17 as he's speaking to Moses and Aaron. He says, "Now therefore please forgive my sin," so far so good, "only this once." Are you never going to sin again, Pharaoh? "And make supplication to the Lord your God that He would only remove this death from me." The problem with Pharaoh is he was upset that he was experiencing the consequences of sin.

A lot of people demonstrate remorse because they got caught. They're not really sorry about the sin. They're sorry about the repercussions or consequences of the sin that they're now suffering. Proverbs 13 and verse 15 tells us that there are consequences for sin. It says in Proverbs 13, verse 15, "But the way of the transgressor is hard." We kind of look at Scripture and the rulebook of God and the blueprint of God and the plans of God as some kind of onerous burden that He puts on us.

Yet Jesus said in John chapter 10, verse 10, "I have come that they may have life and have it to the full." The Ten Commandments are not restrictions. They're guard barriers that protect us from all kinds of consequences that we experience when we transgress the barriers and the borders of God.

Deuteronomy chapter 10 and verse 13 says concerning the law of God, "To keep the Lord's commandments and His statutes which I am commanding you today for your own good." The Ten Commandments of God, the rules of God, the norms of God, the principles of God are not your enemy. They're there as a guardrail. They protect you. They protect us by design from all kinds of dangers that we would experience when we traverse those boundaries.

It's like there at Pikes Peak. A child gets out of a car and starts to run for the edge, not understanding that in some cases there's no guardrail. You yell at the child not because you're mean to the child, but because you're trying to keep the child back from disaster. That's how the Ten Commandments operate in our life. That's how they function. Pharaoh had gone too far. He had traversed the will of God, and now he was experiencing consequences. The consequences were what caused this feigned repentance.

He wasn't glad for the rules of God or the norms of God. He was just upset that he was experiencing consequences for his own decisions. The book of Galatians chapter six, verses six through nine says, "Do not be deceived. God is not mocked, for whatever a man sows, that will he reap." Why does it say God is not mocked? It's saying God has established a principle of life. It's an agrarian principle. It's a farming principle. You put an apple seed into the ground, you're going to get an apple tree. Lemon seed in the ground, a lemon tree.

I guess poison ivy into the ground, you're going to get poison ivy back. If God were to allow a person to put something into the ground but not experience the fruit in kind, He would be rejecting His own principle and mocking Himself. "Do not be deceived. God is not mocked, for whatever a man sows, that will he reap. For the one who sows to his own flesh will from the flesh reap corruption, but the one who sows to the Spirit will from the Spirit reap eternal life. Let us not lose heart in doing good, for in due time we will reap if we don't grow weary."

Keep sowing that good seed. Stay away from the bad seed. Because in time, this principle of God will be honored, and you will reap a harvest in your life. Stay away from the bad seed because the bad seed is going to come up with a bad crop, bad fruit, bad tree, and you'll be sorry because you'll experience all sorts of consequences. That's what Pharaoh is experiencing here. It's the fruit of his own choices. What he wants an escape from is the consequences he's produced via this plague of locusts.

It says in verse 17, "Now therefore please forgive me," Pharaoh speaking, "forgive me my sin only this once and make supplication to the Lord your God that He would remove this death from me." What does he mean by death? Well, the plague of locusts, because it consumed all of the crop all over Egypt, was causing a famine. Because of that famine, death was transpiring. There is a clear principle in the word of God that when we reject God's way and we reject God's will and we reject God's norms and we reject God's law, death follows in all kinds of different forms.

Proverbs chapter eight and verse 36 says, "All these who hate me love death." I find that to be a very interesting proverb because it's a description of people who reject the Scripture, reject Jesus, reject the things of God. Isn't it interesting that such people seem to be in love with death? There's not a right-to-die cause that they don't jump on board with. There's not a right-to-an-abortion cause that they don't jump on board with. It's almost a characteristic of unsaved people that they love death. Proverbs 8:36 says that.

Proverbs 14 and verse 12 says, "There is a way which seems right to a man, but its end is the way of death." In other words, it looks right, but the end thereof is a bad crop coming from bad seed. Our forebears were told this very clearly, were they not, in Eden? Genesis 2, verses 16 and 17: "The Lord God commanded the man saying, 'From any tree of the garden you may eat freely, but from the tree of knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat. For in the day that you eat from it, you will surely die.'" Boy, was that not an accurate fulfillment prophetically of what happened?

First Corinthians chapter 15, verses 21 through 22 says, "For since by a man came death, by a man also came the resurrection of the dead. For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ all will be made alive." No doubt you know Romans 5, verse 12. It says, "Therefore just as through one man sin entered into the world and death through sin, so death spread to all men because all sinned."

Romans 6, verse 23 is no doubt very familiar to all of us. It says, "For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord." Notice that word wage. What is a wage? It's a price. It's a cost. Sin has a cost. It leads to destruction. It leads to death. It leads to all kinds of temporal consequences that we bring on ourselves because we despise the way of the Lord.

Ephesians 2, verse 1 says this was our state before we got saved: it says you were dead in your trespasses and sins. How important this is to understand as a young person with your whole life in front of you and all kinds of glittering and dazzling options and opportunities for you to choose from. Choose wisely, the Bible says. Because if you go down the wrong path and bad seed goes into the ground and a negative crop comes up, sometimes you don't experience the negative crop right away.

You say, "Well, I sinned and there's no consequences. After all, I watch it on TV. I see people sin all of the time, there's no consequences. James Bond never gets a venereal disease." Have you noticed that? There's no unwanted pregnancies or anything from a James Bond situation. It's just you sin with impunity, sexual license, and nothing wrong transpires. So, we have a generation of people that think they can just rebel against the things of God and never experience any consequences. The Bible is very clear that there's a choice here. You choose the wrong door, and it brings forth death.

Deuteronomy 30, verse 19, this is what was spoken to the children of Israel through Moses. It says, "I call heaven and earth to witnesses against you today. I have set before you," just like in Eden, "I have set before you life and death, the blessing and the curse." Notice this: "Choose life in order that you may live, you and your descendants." You've got a choice here. Choose the right path. Choose the ways of God and enjoy a positive harvest rather than a negative one.

Satan is so good at marketing sin as freedom and liberation, and he doesn't tell people on the front end that its end thereof is death. James chapter one, verses 14 and 15 says, "But each one is tempted when he is carried away and enticed by his own lust." So you notice, I can't blame my sin on somebody else. I can't blame my parents. I can't blame my friends. It's I made a conscious decision to sin. I followed my own lust, which is a desire of the sin nature to rebel against the principles of God.

It says, "Then when lust has conceived, it gives birth to sin, and when sin is accomplished, it yields or it brings forth death." This is what Pharaoh is upset about. "I went down the wrong path, I did the wrong thing, I rebelled against God, this plague of locusts has been unleashed on Egypt." As it says back in verses 14 and 15, it's a plague like we've never seen before in Egypt over her very long history. It's destroying the crops and because we don't have food, death has been brought forth, and I want an out of this consequence. An insincere prayer request, an insincere request, but God in His grace answers because God, at the end of the day, is a God of grace, unmerited favor.

It's a beautiful word. It's a Greek word, Charis. It means favor coming to us that we do not deserve and certainly did not earn. So, Pharaoh's request is Moses and Aaron, make a supplication for me. As you look there at verse 17, you'll see the word supplication. What is a supplication? What is a prayer of supplication? Paul talks about prayers of supplication. In Philippians 4, verses six and seven, Paul says, "Be anxious for nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known to God. And the peace of God which surpasses all comprehension will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus."

I cannot tell you how many times those two verses have allowed me to sleep soundly at night when my mind was whirling because of anxiety and worry, which would have kept me up if not half the night, all night. I simply say to myself by memory Philippians chapter 4, verses six and seven, and I do what it says I should do, which is bring to the Lord a prayer of supplication. From the word supplication, we get the word supply. "Lord, I'm asking you to supply my need."

And when I entrust that need to the Lord, what happens? Verse seven: "And the peace of God," it's a reciprocal promise, "which surpasses all comprehension," the world can't figure this one out. That's why they're taking substances into their bodies or into their mind constantly. They don't have the peace of God. The unbelievers. "And the peace of God which surpasses all comprehension will guard," it's a military term, "your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus." I can't tell you how many nights could have been sleepless, turned into very restful nights because I simply repeated in my mind those two verses and I said, "Lord, here's my need, you take over. You supply the need," whatever the need at the time might be.

I'm here to tell you as evidence of this that this promise that the peace of God which surpasses all understanding will guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus, this is a real promise. It's a reciprocal promise, and it's all rooted in this concept of supplication or supply. I'm not sure how much of this Pharaoh knew, but he knew the source of the destruction that was happening in Egypt and he says to Moses and Aaron, "Make a prayer of supplication for me. Supply my need."

And what's interesting about all of this in verses 18 through 20 is God answers. Do you believe God answers prayer? Moses and Aaron leave now for the last time with this particular judgment. The presence of Pharaoh. There's an exit. You see that there in chapter 10 and verse 18. It says, "He went out from Pharaoh and made supplication to the Lord." He exited just like in the prior conversation, verse 6, he exited. This is now the third conversation. Second conversation with Pharaoh, he exited, verse 11.

He gets out from the presence of Pharaoh and he gets into the presence of the Lord, Moses does, and he offers this prayer of supplication. He asks God to supply the need: stop the plague so that this destruction to the crop will stop and the famine will stop and the death will stop. Don't feel bad as a Christian about praying for your needs. Jesus actually taught us to pray that way, did he not? In the so-called Lord's Prayer, which is really not the Lord's Prayer, it's the disciples' prayer. He was teaching them how to pray.

It's an amazing prayer, and part of it is, "Give us this day our daily bread." Ask God to supply a need in your life if there is a lack. You shouldn't feel bad about doing that. You shouldn't feel guilty about doing that. There are all kinds of lacks or deficits that we have. Financially, perhaps health-wise, and there's no shame in asking God to supply a need. After all, that's how Jesus taught us to pray. And what you're going to see there in verse 19 in just a moment is an amazing answer to prayer.

Prayer is far more powerful than most of us give credence to. The book of James chapter 5 and verse 16 talks about Elijah and what his prayer life accomplished. James chapter 5 and verse 16, it says, "The effective prayer of a righteous man," I can add, of course, or woman, "availeth much. It accomplishes much." You see, the arm of the flesh is only going to take you so far through human energy.

If you really want to see things change in your life, then become a person of prayer because now it's not your arm anymore. It's God's arm, and God has a much longer reach than you have. He's got a much larger reach than I have. And then James gives an example. "Elijah was a man with a nature like ours. He was just a normal guy. He put his shoes on one foot at a time like the rest of us. And he prayed earnestly that it would not rain and it did not rain on the earth for three years and six months." Almost like he lived here in Texas or something.

"Then he prayed again and the sky poured rain and the earth produced its fruit." It's interesting how his prayer life could even alter meteorology. 1 John chapter 5 and verse 14 says that if we ask according to His will, He hears us. If you have a prayer request that's aligned with the will of God, it's almost like there's no stopping it. But sometimes our prayers don't get any higher than the ceiling because we're asking, as the book of James tells us, I believe in chapter four, we ask amiss. We ask for selfish desires, and God has no interest in answering those kinds of prayers.

But the better I understand His will as revealed in His word, you can't know the will of God without the Word of God, so prayer and the Word of God go together. The better I understand His will as revealed in His word, the better I know how to focus my specific petitions and as that happens, my prayers take on greater strength, greater power, greater effectiveness.

Jesus, of course, told a parable about this in Luke 18, beginning in verse one. It says, "Now He was telling them a parable to show that at all times they or men ought to pray and not to lose heart." I think the King James translates that this way: "Men ought to pray always and to not grow faint." It's so easy under life circumstances to become despondent, discouraged. Circumstances are bigger than us. What do you do in your life when you have circumstances bigger than you? Well, you go to prayer.

You pray to the Lord, you communicate to the Lord. And as you pray that prayer of supplication, asking God to supply a need, Paul promises that the peace of God which transcends all understanding will guard our hearts and minds just like a military guard guarding our thoughts and minds in Christ Jesus and we begin to experience the peace of God which transcends all understanding.

And you might be wondering, "Well, does God really listen?" Jesus went on there in Luke 18 and he started to talk about a parable, a story of a person, a widow, a woman that was not given justice. And she kept crying out to this judge for justice, and he was really tired of listening to her. Luke 18 tells us he was a judge that didn't love God or didn't love man. Great guy, right? He'd probably be good on our Supreme Court. Didn't love God, didn't love man.

But you know what? Because she petitioned him so frequently, he relinquished to her request for justice. And the point is not to compare this judge to God. It's to show that if persistence pays off with somebody that doesn't love God and doesn't love man, then how much more will your Father in heaven listen to the prayer requests of His people as they persist? I found many times in my life I pray for something, I don't get it right away. There's a season of delay, and the reason there's a season of delay is because God is trying to teach me something. He's trying to teach me how to persevere in prayer.

Persist in prayer. Don't just give up. Don't give up so fast. Don't give up so quickly. If God has placed a desire in your heart, and Psalm 37 verse four says, "Delight yourself in the Lord and He will give you the desires of your heart," it could be any desire. The desire to meet a spouse, the desire to be in the right career, healing of the body, restoration of a relationship. If God has put that desire in your heart and you don't get the desire met instantaneously, then continue on in prayer. Persevere.

As Jesus taught us in Matthew 7, verses seven through 11, He says, "Keep on seeking. Keep on asking. Keep on knocking." Is the way it reads in the original language, and the door will be opened to you. And so what is being described here is Moses could move the hand of God. He could stop a locust judgment from destroying everything in Egypt and causing more and more famine and more and more death because he went to the Lord in prayer.

It's interesting that Pharaoh himself seems to recognize this and Moses's relationship with God. So to put it in modern vernacular, he says, "Put in a good word for me with the man upstairs. Can you do that?" It's kind of interesting that Pharaoh saw in Moses a relationship with God and he knew where the source of power was in Moses's life. It's exactly the same way in your life. I mean, there's a reason why people come to you when things in their own life aren't working out, unsaved friends, family members that you might have, unsaved coworkers.

Boy, it's all fun and games and smiles and laughs, but it's completely different when the bottom of their life drops out. The layoff notice comes, the doctor's report, "There's something on the doctor's report I need to talk to you about." Those kind of life emergencies, and it's very interesting how they will go to you because they know you know Jesus, to ask for prayer. "Hey, put in a word for me because I know where your source of power comes from."

And we need to be in that place of availability where people can see God working through our lives. And when people come to you and say, "Please pray for me about such and such," what an honor that is. They obviously have a great deal of respect for you and more important than respect for you is respect for the God that has a relationship with you. And so this is what Pharaoh asks Moses to do. And you know what? God answers.

Verse 19: "So the Lord shifted the wind to a very strong west wind, which took up the locusts and drove them into the Red Sea, but not one locust was left in the territory of Egypt." So, the east wind, if you go back to verse 13, blew the locusts into Egypt. Look back for a minute at verse 13, Exodus chapter 10. It says, "So Moses stretched out his staff over the land of Egypt, and the Lord directed an east wind on the land all that day and all that night. And when it was morning, the east wind brought in the locusts." So, the east wind brought them in, Moses prays, and the west wind brought them out. Amazing.

Did you know that God uses different instruments to accomplish His will? I mean, I guess God could have put out His massive hand, assuming God has hands, and just grabbed all the locusts in one place, but He didn't do that. He used a wind to push them in, He used a wind to push them out. The book of Jonah—Pastor Gabe preaching through the book of Jonah recently—the book of Jonah talks about this all of the time.

Jonah chapter 4 and verse 8: it says, "When the sun came up, God appointed a scorching east wind." That's exactly what we're reading about here, here it's the west wind, but earlier it was the east wind. "And the sun beat down on Jonah's head so that he became faint and begged with all his soul to die." Wow. Saying death is better to me than life itself. What brought Jonah to that point? God appointed an east wind.

And as you continue on in the book of Jonah, Jonah chapter 1 verse 4: it says, "The Lord hurled a great wind on the sea, and there was a great storm on the sea so that the ship was about to break up." See, Jonah thought he could outrun God. How do you outrun somebody that controls the weather? How do you outrun someone that controls the wind?

And then if that weren't enough, Jonah 1 verse 17, you know the book very well, it says, "The Lord appointed a great fish to swallow Jonah, and Jonah was in the stomach of the fish for three days and three nights." God controls the animal kingdom. And then the verses we just read, Jonah chapter 4 verses 6 and 7, it says, "The Lord appointed a plant and it grew up over Jonah to be a shade over his head and to deliver him from discomfort. And Jonah was extremely happy about the plant." Boy, that I read that verse, I say, "Lord, that's me."

I like the air conditioning, I like the creature comforts, I like the cable TV to work. Love the house. But what about the people all over the city of Sugar Land and the city of Houston that don't know their right hand from their left? Jonah was really happy about the creature comforts. About the Ninevites that knew not their right hand from their left, people walking in darkness, Jonah really wasn't all that concerned about it.

And so God deals with that by taking away the plant. How did He take away the plant? Because He appointed a worm. Jonah chapter 4 verse 7, God appointed a worm when dawn came the next day, and it attacked the plant and it withered. And God is getting Jonah to understand, you love your creature comforts but you don't love the things that I want to do. Your heart is not broken over the things that break my heart.

What a great prayer request that is. You want to see God answer a prayer request in your life? Try this one out: "Lord, break my heart for the things that break your heart." You pray something like that, you're directly in the will of God, and you'll start to see the hand of God move in your life in an amazing way and He'll show you things that you really didn't fully understand or see before. We're so wrapped up as Americans in our very comfortable lifestyles and version of Christianity that we're really not looking at the eternal things that break the heart of God: your neighbor, our coworker that doesn't know Christ personally and is headed for a Christless eternity. Very little thought for them, a lot of thought over personal success, personal comfort, those types of things.

And so Jonah is brought to this place of maturity, and it's all related to the answering of prayer. God is very good in answering prayer because He controls the wind, He controls the fish, He controls the plant, He controls the worm. He's got a lot of tools at His disposal to touch our lives and the lives of other people. So, the east wind in response to Moses's prayer drives the locusts out.

And where do they get driven out to? They get driven out, these locusts, into the Red Sea area. There you see the Red Sea, this is assuming the traditional location of Mount Sinai, there's a debate on that, but there's the Red Sea. There's the Red Sea. Here's Mount Sinai there. Here's another map showing you where the Red Sea is down here.

And so you'll notice that as these locusts were driven out, they were driven to a real place of geography. All these places that we're reading about in the Bible—Egypt, Mount Sinai, Arabia, Midian, where Moses was for what was it, 40 years, the journey of the Israelites into the Transjordan where they deal with the Edomites and the Moabites and the Ammonites and the electric-lights and the out-of-sights and the mosquito bites and the termites and all that—I mean, these are like real people, real people groups, real places of geography. That's how your Bible reads.

Jonah went to preach to the Ninevites. There really was a Nineveh. We're not reading Veggie Tales here. We're not reading tall tales, Jack and the Beanstalk. We're reading history. All of these historical sites, these places of geography. Almost reads like Mapsco. It's a map. It's geography. It's history. That's how your Bible comes to you.

The truth of the matter is if you can't trust the Bible on geography and history and archaeology, if you can't trust the Bible in the things you can see and verify, how in the world are you ever supposed to trust it on things you can't see? Angels, demons, heaven, hell, sin, salvation, God, the tri-unity of God, the holiness of God. I mean, if the Bible is inaccurate on these matters, then how do you trust it on anything else that it ever speaks to us through authoritatively?

I was very close, living in the Southern California area, to attend a seminary. It would have been much easier on me to attend that seminary. It was local. But I decided not to attend that seminary because they would not take a position on the full inerrancy of the Bible. They said the Bible has mistakes in it related to science, archaeology, geography, history. Although when the Bible talks about things that we can't see, it is inerrant, without error. So that's a viewpoint called Partial Inerrancy, and I thought to myself, "Well, that is just crazy to teach that."

To teach at that school, the professors did not have to take a stand on full inerrancy, which to me was problematic because if the Bible is wrong on the things that I can see, how in the world could I trust it on all those other things? And they would say things like, Jesus talked about the seed which is the smallest seed, and we know that it really wasn't the smallest seed. So therefore, there's a mistake in the Bible related to science. Not factoring in that Jesus was not making a worldwide statement about seed. He was making a statement about what was happening in the land of Israel.

But they would boldly say that Jesus made an error. And if Jesus made an error there, then maybe Jesus makes an error when He says your sins are forgiven. You have eternal life when you trust in me. Why is this statement about botany wrong but the statement about eternal life is true? So, we take a position here that the Bible is completely 100% true. And if there's something in the Bible that looks like it's an error, you know what? Maybe I'm misreading the Bible. Maybe I need to get more of an educated opinion about what the certain passage says.

Men like Gleason Archer, Norman Geisler, countless others have devoted themselves to this, showing that the Bible has no mistakes in it. If you think there's a mistake in the Bible, you don't take the word of Dan Rather for it. You rethink your position, and are you reading it correctly? Because at the end of the day, God can't lie. He can't be wrong. So if I think there's an error in the Bible, maybe there's a problem with me and my understanding of a given passage rather than casting doubts on the entire Bible. But people do this quite glibly, quite routinely, and I believe it's a satanic strategy because Satan knows he can create doubt and havoc in the mind of the Christian who's sitting in front of the television and the History Channel or Mysteries of the Bible or A&E or some scholar from Harvard tells you that the Bible is wrong on a certain point. The Bible is not wrong. The Bible can't be wrong. I can be wrong in my reading of it.

But at the end of the day, the Bible itself will never be wrong. And if that is so, I can take everything it says right to the bank, including the things in the Bible that I cannot validate through eyewitness testimony: heaven, hell, angels, demons, sin, salvation, etc. So that's why it will keep saying things like the Red Sea and Egypt and remember where the children of Israel spent so much time, Goshen, which is a real place in Egypt.

All you gotta do is watch Mike Lindell and the My Pillow commercials because he talks over and over again about these Giza dream sheets. And I don't get any extra money from him for saying this, but every time that commercial comes on, my wife says, "That's Goshen." And it is. I think they should be called Goshen dream sheets, not Giza dream sheets, but that's just me. But that's an actual real place. See that?

So, that's why it will talk about the locusts were driven to the Red Sea. And look what God did. Not only did He drive the locusts out with the east wind, but look what it says in verse 19: "But not one locust was left in all the territory of Egypt." Compare that to how the locusts were described when they came in with the judgment. Verses 14 and 15, it says, "The locusts came up over all the land of Egypt and settled in the territory of Egypt. They were numerous. There had not been so many locusts, nor would there be so many again. For they covered the surface of the whole land so that the land was darkened, and they ate every plant of the land and all of the fruit of the trees that the hail had left. Thus nothing green was left on tree or plant of the field through all of the land of Egypt." This was a horrific judgment. And God brought it, and He said He was going to bring it.

And then He just shifts the wind, and the emptying out of the locusts is just as comprehensive as when they came in. I mean, just in a nanosecond, they're gone. Not one locust was left in all the territory of Egypt. Let me tell you something about God. God is so gracious that He can take the consequences of our sin and erase them. Did you know that? Doesn't Joel talk about that and other prophets? God will restore the crops which the locusts have eaten.

Isn't the Bible filled with this example of God erasing the consequences of our sin? And the greatest consequence that I have of my sin is I'm separated from God. I'm alienated from God. I don't sin, let me put it this way: my sin doesn't make me a sinner. I sin because I already am a sinner. I'm just fulfilling my job description. And because we are born in Adam's lineage, we are born into this world separated from God and hurling towards a Christless eternity.

If a person puts their trust in Christ, that consequence, which is horrific, just disappears. Psalm 103 and verse 12: "As far as the east is from the west, so far He has removed our transgressions from us." I used to look at that and say, "How come it doesn't say 'as far as the north is from the south'? Why does it say 'as far as the east is from the west'?" Well, because there's a North Pole and a South Pole. There's no East Pole and West Pole. So when you say "as far as the north is from the south," that's a finite line.

When you say "as far as the east is from the west," that's an infinite line. That's a line that goes on forever and ever and ever. That's what Jesus offers people. Put your trust in me and what I did for you on the cross 2,000 years ago, and the consequence of your sin, which is the most severe, will be taken away just like that. It's a beautiful doctrine, the fancy name for it is expiation.

When the Day of Atonement happened, Leviticus 16, there were two animals that were brought in on the Day of Atonement, the day of covering. One animal, you'll read all of this in Leviticus 16, was released into the wilderness. The other animal was killed, the blood was applied once a year, and the priest had to follow specific instructions to the mercy seat which cancelled the nation's note of indebtedness for a year, Yom Kippur, Day of Covering.

And you'll see all of this described in Leviticus 16, and you ask yourself, "Why two animals? Isn't one animal enough?" One animal is not enough because God is using the two animals to teach two different things. The first is propitiation, which is the satisfaction of divine wrath. God took out His wrath against Israel's sin for that year through the first animal. The blood was applied to the mercy seat on Yom Kippur, etc.

Well, what's the second animal doing there? It was released into the wilderness, which revealed a second truth called expiation, meaning the eternal consequences of your sin are now removed, ultimately fulfilled in Jesus Christ. Sin debt is thrown as far as the east is from the west, which is an infinite line. Animal A: propitiation. Animal B: expiation, the removal of sin's penalty, the removal of sin's consequence because the wrath of God, propitiation, was satisfied with Animal A. See that? So, one animal couldn't describe these two realities. So, that's why in Leviticus 16, you have not one animal there, you have two animals there.

This is what this reminds me of when God is so aggressive with the wind that now comes in, that it's almost like the locusts were never there at all, even though what we read earlier was a very severe judgment, caused Pharaoh to cry out for help. It's a glorious thing to know Jesus personally and to know that propitiation applies to us. God's wrath against our sin is satisfied. And to also know that expiation applies to us, where He has taken the eternal consequence of our sin and thrown them as far as the east is from the west.

The Bible says He takes those sins and He washes them in a sea of forgetfulness. I don't know how that works with God. How does God forget something? I have a tendency to think that's more anthropomorphic language trying to get us to relate to God. You could go to God and you say, "Remember that sin I committed earlier?" He says, "I actually don't remember that." At bare minimum, He says, "I don't hold you accountable for that. That's been paid for." Propitiation. The consequence for it has been eternally removed. Expiation.

This is what Lewis Sperry Chafer called salvation words. When Lewis Sperry Chafer would teach in Bible conferences, he would love to teach the doctrine of salvation and he taught the different salvation words as his conference talk. One talk was propitiation. One talk was expiation. One talk was atonement. And he would develop these salvation concepts from the word of God. So the locusts are gone. In fact, I'm going to restore the years that the locusts have consumed.

My cousin was a mess, as he'll tell you, prior to his salvation. You're dealing with, now this would go back to Teen Challenge years where he was put because they didn't know what to do with him. Alcohol abuse, drug abuse, every kind of abuse you can imagine because he was so out of control. My uncle and aunt took him to this place called Teen Challenge, you may have heard of that ministry, David Wilkerson founded it. Well, my cousin found Jesus at that ministry. And he fully expected that when he left substance abuse, he was going to go through withdrawals. Everybody expected it.

His testimony to this day is he had maybe some headaches, which is very minor relative to withdrawals. It's almost like God in love stepped out and took a consequence away. I can't guarantee that that happens in every circumstance, but I know that it's within the outworking of God to do that kind of thing. You may have messed up something so bad as we all do from time to time, yours truly included, and you might cry out to God with a sincere heart and God in His grace might say, "You know what, I'm even going to remove the earthly consequence for your decision." The eternal consequences are long gone. That's expiation.

It ends very tragically with Pharaoh hardening his heart. It says in verse 20, "But the Lord hardened Pharaoh's heart and he did not let the sons of Israel go." Now you say, "Pastor, I thought you said Pharaoh hardened his heart and the Bible here says God hardened his heart." So which is it? And if you've been with us in this study, you know the answer to that.

Ed Hindson says for the initial five plagues, the text registers Pharaoh as the agent of hardening. Not until the sixth plague does God participate in the confirmation of Pharaoh's own volitional choices. Charles Ryrie writes seven times Pharaoh hardened his own heart before God first hardened it, though he predicted in advance that he would harden it. The prediction of God hardening Pharaoh's heart is in Exodus 4:21. Pharaoh repeatedly hardened his own heart one, two, three, four, five, six times.

And then finally, with plague six, Exodus 9:12, God gave Pharaoh over to what he wanted to do, which is frightening. God gives people over. Romans 1, verses 18 through 32, I think three times in that chapter it says God gave them over. And what you learn is God gave them over because they gave up on God. Romans 1, verses 18 through 20: "For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness and men who suppress the truth in unrighteousness, because that which is known about God is within them, for God made it evident to them. For since the creation of the world His invisible attributes, His power and divine nature have been clearly seen being understood through what has been made, so that men are without excuse."

They suppressed the truth, and so God gave them over after they first gave up on God. See how it works? That's how it works with Pharaoh. That's how it works with anybody. God is not in the business of overriding people's free will. I showed you the quote in Sunday school, those of you that were here, where C.S. Lewis describes hell as a door locked from the inside, meaning God doesn't send people to hell. People send themselves to hell by rejecting, rejecting, rejecting, rejecting, rejecting and then finally God says, "I'll give you what you want. I'll cement the decision." It's a frightening thing.

And this, of course, is a good lead-in to the gospel because if you're here today rejecting, don't assume that the grace of God of His conviction just goes on forever. I mean, you reach a point where God gives you over to what you want. And God, it looks to me like He has to do that because we're made in His image. And part of being made in the image of God includes volition and free will. And for God to override my free will and coerce me to be a Christian or coerce me to be a believer is for God not to respect how He manufactured me and manufactured you.

The most powerful thing you have as an image-bearer of God is free will and volition. Use it wisely. Don't use it contrary to the things of God. Because you reach a point as it says in Genesis 6:3 where God says, "My Spirit will not strive with man forever." The Bible teaches that today is a day of salvation. If you hear His voice, place your trust in Him, because He's the only one that can help you.

A pastor can't help you, an elder board can't help you, a church can't help you, your friends can't help you, family members can't help you, coworkers can't help you, but Jesus can help you. He can get you into a right relationship with the God that made you and the God that redeemed you through the gospel. His final words on the cross were "It is finished." It's not "I bought lunch, now you leave the tip." It's you trust in the completed work of Jesus for your eternity and for your salvation. I hope and pray and trust many people within the sound of my voice will do that. If it's something you need more explanation on, I'm available after the service to talk. Shall we pray?

Lord, we're grateful for the book of Exodus and the spiritual truths that it teaches us. Help us to walk these things out by faith this week as your people. We'll be careful to give you all the praise and the glory. We ask these things in Jesus' name. And God's people said, "Amen."