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[0:00] So we'll get to the execution of the plague. And so let's read this, the last section of this chapter, beginning in verse 22. The Lord has already announced what he's going to do.

[0:11] We saw last week that some feared the word of the Lord in verse 20, and some did not regard the word of the Lord. We saw different responses to this message of sending to those and left them in the field and so forth.

[0:25] So here comes the plague. Verse 22, let's read. And the Lord said unto Moses, stretch forth thine hand toward heaven, that there may be hail in all the land of Egypt, upon man and upon beast, and upon every herb of the field throughout the land of Egypt.

[0:41] And Moses stretched forth his rod toward heaven. And the Lord sent thunder and hail, and the fire ran along upon the ground. And the Lord rained hail upon the land of Egypt. So there was hail and fire mingled with the hail, very grievous, such as there was none like it in all the land of Egypt since it became a nation.

[1:00] And the hail smote throughout all the land of Egypt, all that was in the field, both man and beast. And the hail smote every herb of the field and break every tree of the field. Only in the land of Goshen, where the children of Israel were, there was there no hail.

[1:13] And Pharaoh sent and called for Moses and Aaron and said unto them, I have sinned this time. The Lord is righteous, and I and my people are wicked. And treat the Lord, for it's enough, that there be no more mighty thunderings and hail, and I will let you go, and ye shall stay no longer.

[1:32] Moses said unto him, As soon as I'm gone out of the city, I will spread abroad my hands unto the Lord, and the thunder shall cease, neither shall there be any more hail, that thou mayest know how that the earth is the Lord's.

[1:44] But as for thee and thy servants, I know that ye will not yet fear the Lord God. And the flax and the barley was smitten, and the barley was in the ear, and the flax was bald.

[1:55] That means it was forming its seed pods. They were very close to maturity. And verse 32, But the wheat and the rye were not smitten, for they were not grown up. And Moses went out of the city from Pharaoh, and spread abroad his hands unto the Lord, and the thunders and hail ceased, and the rain was not poured upon the earth.

[2:13] And when Pharaoh saw that the rain and the hail and the thunders were ceased, he sinned yet more, and hardened his heart, he and his servants. And the heart of Pharaoh was hardened. Neither would he let the children of Israel go, as the Lord had spoken by Moses.

[2:27] Now, before we go anywhere, I want to introduce something else to this. This is a grievous storm. But would you take your Bible, keep your place, but would you flip over to Job and chapter 37?

[2:42] Job, just before the Psalms, you'll find Job 37. I just want to point a verse out to you. And then we'll come back to Exodus chapter 9.

[3:02] So you're in Job 37, and the passage describes God's thundering in verse 4 and verse 5, and snow and rain and 6, and he's describing storms.

[3:17] And he describes a whirlwind in verse 9. And as he gets down, I want to read to you verse number 13. He gives some reasons why he sends storms.

[3:28] In verse 13, he says, He causeth it to come, whether for correction, or for his land, or for mercy. He causeth it to come.

[3:41] And of course, what we're reading in Exodus is definitely for correction. This Pharaoh, this new king of Egypt that rose up in the land, did not know Joseph. And as you recall, going all the way back to months ago in chapter 1, this man looked at this mighty nation becoming just incredibly large so quickly and said, I've got to do something because peradventure some enemies should come and they could turn against us and go with them and we'd be in a bad spot.

[4:09] So here's what I'm going to do. I'm going to flick them with taskmasters. And he calls them their lives to be, to serve with hard labor and with rigor. And they were oppressed and they cried out to God and God heard their cry and he's come to deliver them.

[4:24] And he's not leaving this king of Egypt unpunished. So there's no doubt that this storm is being sent, among the other plagues, for correction. But there's other reasons God sends storms.

[4:36] I want you to be aware of that because we're going to see some things in this storm and some responses and some things that the outcomes of this particular storm. But I want you to know, not everything that happens bad in your life is because God's beating on you or because God's punishing your sins.

[4:54] That's not always the case. Sometimes it's blessing. It doesn't seem like it. We heard a message, just a few of us heard a message the other night on Paul's thorn in his flesh. It was the messenger of Satan sent to buffet him, but it was of the hand of God.

[5:10] And you could call that a storm sent into his life, much like there's storms sent into your life from time to time, seasons of life, bad things come. It's not always because you're getting beat up for your sins.

[5:21] Sometimes you're reaping what you've sown. But other times it's by the mercy of God. He's doing something. So just understand that. We do know that Exodus is correction.

[5:34] I'll read a quick verse from Psalm 83. This is an Old Testament prayer against the enemies of Israel. And they pray to God and they say, so persecute them with thy tempest and make them afraid with thy storm.

[5:49] And so that's a legitimate prayer in the Old Testament against the enemies of Israel. Here in Exodus chapter nine, we're reading God contesting with Pharaoh. We're reading him punishing and correcting this man and his land.

[6:03] But I want you to understand as things come into your life, you'll have a reaction to them and you don't have to see it always as I'm being punished right now. So let's pray and then we'll get back into Exodus chapter nine.

[6:16] Lord, as we open up this text, this is once again, it's a precious time in our lives, a precious time in our week to gather and assemble and to sit and to hear the word of God.

[6:30] Lord, please make this a special time. Do something magnificent in this time. Use your word and use your spirit to move in our midst, in our hearts and to drive deep this truth into us.

[6:43] Lord, may we not leave unaffected and may we not be distracted by things that mean nothing. God, please arrest our attention and feed us from the word of God and get glory that you deserve.

[6:56] We pray in Jesus name. Amen. Amen. So God sends a storm. As I said here, it's obviously for correction. What we read in this seventh plague, we read in verse 18 that God said he's going to, we didn't read that I guess, but last week, a very grievous hail.

[7:15] And it's never been experienced by anybody in the land, such a horrible storm. Have you ever been in a spot in life? You've seen something, you had something, you've just, it drops your jaw, you're in awe because you've never had it.

[7:28] I mean, I've never seen it that bad. Out here, I don't know, you just don't get the storms like we did at back east. You get those thunderstorms that just come in in the afternoon and they just bang and crash and they move on.

[7:40] I'm sure this was far worse. But here, you just don't get those experiences. But when you do, like last winter, there was this tropical storm or whatever that was that came working its way up to Baja and came up the coast.

[7:52] And everybody's like, we've never had this in our lifetime. We've never had this much rain. And it flooded and there was devastation. The houses and hillsides and mudslides and cars are underwater.

[8:03] And a lot of devastation took place. Everybody said, I've never seen it like that before. Well, this is the case. There's a grievous hail. In addition to that, we read verse 23, the Lord sent thunder and hail and it said fire ran.

[8:18] You ever seen that? You've seen that here. Fire running across these hills when it gets going. Moving at 50 miles an hour sometimes. Fire running across the ground. It goes on to say in verse 24 that there was hail and fire mingled with the hail.

[8:35] Very grievous. Finally, later in verse 33, it described rain being poured upon the earth. In Psalm 78, it describes this looking back and the Bible, the author says, he destroyed their vines with hail and their sycamore trees with frost.

[8:55] He gave up their cattle also to the hail and their flocks to hot thunderbolts. That sounds like lightning to me, hot thunderbolts. I guess because of the references to thunder in the passage.

[9:09] Thunder is a product of a shockwave of the lightning. It's interesting though, the text we read in chapter nine doesn't mention lightning anywhere. You read about fire, but you don't read about lightning.

[9:21] And that's, it's in the Old Testament, I think 20 some times. I'm kind of peculiar that it's not mentioned there at all. We suppose it was quite lively in this storm. So this is the seventh plague and God sends unparalleled storm and destruction upon the land of Egypt like they'd never seen before.

[9:42] His purpose, as he's already stated, was to destroy their crops. He's going to destroy their vineyards. He's going to destroy their orchards. He's targeting, this plague is targeting the agriculture of Egypt.

[9:56] And in doing so, he's further crippling, further demoralizing this mighty nation and this proud king. Their fields were pummeled with hail.

[10:08] Their fields were burned with fire. In Psalm 105, it says he gave them hail for rain and flaming fire in their land. And just a brief rundown of what we read, thunder is mentioned five times.

[10:24] Raining hail is mentioned twice, whereas rain itself is mentioned twice. Fire is mentioned twice, but without a doubt, the primary factor, the most mentioned and given the most attention is hail.

[10:38] 14 times in 14 verses, the word hail. And even in the next chapter, it's mentioned again three more times. Hail is something God uses for destruction. It's one of his tools of destruction.

[10:49] It shows up in the Bible several times. Joshua 10, it shows up in several of the prophets as threats against the wicked. It shows up in Revelation a few times in the tribulation period where God is using his tool of hail to kill and to destroy.

[11:05] I recall growing a garden back in Pennsylvania and doing all the work of preparing the soil and turning it over and getting certain additives and additional mushroom soil, they called it, mixing it in and getting it all just as good as I could and leveled out and patted down and then planting all the seeds and rows.

[11:24] And it was days of work. I enjoyed it so much. And then these little green beans started coming up. And I had three long rows of green beans, probably as wide as this auditorium or close.

[11:36] And they all came up and they came up and spread their leaves and got rid of the rabbits that were trying to eat them. Hallelujah. And those green beans, three long rows looking great, just bright green, healthy, young, fresh coming up.

[11:49] And I'd say they're probably about six to eight inches up out of the ground. Some additional leaves were spreading out. Those big first leaves turned out good three, four inch wide. And then a storm came one afternoon, a heavy, heavy rain.

[12:03] And it was rare, but sometimes we'd get hail in those storms. In the very center of that cell, it would be purple on our radar as I'd watch the radar screen on my computer. And I was like, oh no, we're getting hail.

[12:14] Hail is coming right across our property, our house. And sure enough, it came and it banged and it really dumped a good bit. It felt like a half inch of hail on the porch and it sprinkled all through the grass.

[12:26] And when I went around the back, oh, my heart broke. Oh, my poor beans. They were destroyed. There was hardly a bean plant that remained.

[12:37] They were just all broken over and snapped in half and the little tender things were gone. And I looked at it and I just thought for a moment, like, if I let it be, I'll probably get about 20% of what I planted.

[12:53] But why would I want to do that? I immediately started ripping out the broken ones, sticking a seed right down into that hole and just going right back at it because it was done. There's nothing I could do.

[13:05] That hail came through and it destroyed my precious little beans. But I'm talking about a tiny little plot. What we're looking at here is all of the land of Egypt.

[13:16] You know, when you see a tornado, recently there's been some storms, right, in the Midwest. And you can look at a little flyover afterwards and you can see exactly where that tornado touched down. You can see this barn standing, but that one's just debris.

[13:29] You can see that. If we could look with a drone's view of this thing, we would see devastation everywhere. We would see all of the trees in the field broken down and smashed and still blackened and smoldering with smoke.

[13:44] The entire land would look like a war zone had come through here. It had literally been bombed from heaven with hail and fire, complete destruction.

[13:55] So God sent a storm. And this morning, when God allows and when he sends a storm, it's always on purpose. Understand that. But let's consider some of the outcomes that we see from this passage here.

[14:08] The first thing I want to show you is there's an immediate impact. And in verse 24, let's read it again, 24 and 25 says, So there was hail and fire mingled with hail, very grievous, such as there was none like it in all the land of Egypt since it became a nation.

[14:25] And the hail smote throughout all the land of Egypt, all that was in the field, both man and beast. And the hail smote every herb of the field and break every tree of the field.

[14:38] There's an immediate impact. And I'll say that this impact is a crisis. There's death and there's destruction. Now, these storms, like I've already mentioned, left this land looking like a complete war zone.

[14:53] We are viewing a nationwide crisis. I say this every time we get into a new plague. We're so quick to read through and not analyze and understand how devastating each one was.

[15:06] This one is not any different. A nationwide crisis, devastating to their morale, devastating to their national strength and pride.

[15:19] They've just gotten destroyed. They've just gotten a storm that they've never ever seen before, bigger and badder and longer and more destructive. They have nothing to compare this to, but just a look at the wreckage that it left behind.

[15:35] It's a crisis. And when crisis comes, oftentimes it's significant loss. It may not be of plants in a field.

[15:47] It may not be of some trees that you've been tenderly working with and growing. It could be a child. It could be a parent. It could be a job that you've worked so hard for.

[15:58] You can lose some things in your life that immediately have an impact. Immediately, there's destruction. There's crisis.

[16:09] There's pain. The immediate impact when there's crisis is crying over the loss of people or of possessions. There's hurt, and there's no way of avoiding the pain.

[16:24] There's no way of avoiding the loss. Oh, you can try to fight Pat. You just can't. It's going to hit you. It's going to hit you hard. You're going to feel it. You're going to have to deal with it.

[16:34] And that's where these Egyptians are, right here. There's an immediate impact from this storm and its grievous loss. You know what crisis has a way of doing?

[16:46] It has a way of shocking your system. It has a way of just waking you up. All of a sudden, what's on TV tonight is just not really that attractive.

[16:57] Sometimes just conversations with neighbors and acquaintances just, you know, you could just do without it because there's other things on your mind. There's other things on your heart.

[17:09] And sometimes you can't think clearly. Sometimes you can't process things clearly. You get rattled. You get affected. There's immediate impact when there's a crisis, when there's a storm.

[17:23] But how should we respond to crisis? Let me ask you a question. Can you think, we're going to have a little group discussion this morning. Can you think of one situation that God would send your way where he does not want you to turn to him?

[17:41] Let's just have a good long discussion on all of the things God sends our ways, the storms and the trials and the temptations and the crises that we face within our days on this planet.

[17:54] Let's just discuss all of the ones that God's really not interested in hearing our voice. I think you know I'm being quite rhetorical here. What is the right way to respond when the trial comes or when the crisis hits, when the storm destroys?

[18:12] Take your Bible and flip back to Hebrews chapter number four. I could quote it, but you should read it and you should mark it down and make this a part of your life and a part of your response to crisis.

[18:29] Hebrews chapter four. And all the way to the end of this chapter, let's read the last three verses.

[18:42] It's a something, a beautiful statement of our Lord Jesus Christ. Hebrews four, verse number 14 says, seeing then that we have a great high priest that is passed into the heavens, Jesus, the son of God, let us hold fast our profession.

[19:02] For we have not a high priest which cannot be touched with the feeling of our infirmities. I want to back up and remind you, he says, let us hold fast. You're supposed to hold on because you have somebody that you can reach out to.

[19:17] We have not a high priest which cannot be touched with the feelings of our infirmities. So there it is. But was in all points tempted like as we are yet without sin. Let us therefore come boldly under the throne of grace.

[19:31] Why would we do that? That we may obtain mercy. Amen. And find grace to help. Amen. In time of need. In crisis.

[19:43] In storms. Hold fast. Why? Because we have somebody that we can reach out to. And we can come boldly by the grace of God to that throne of grace and get some stuff.

[19:58] When crisis comes, it cannot and should never be an excuse to give up. It should never be an excuse to dive into some deep depression where the world is dark and I'm indifferent.

[20:14] And all I feel is pain. You have, you have, as a child of God, a great high priest who can be touched with the feelings, the feelings, the hurt, the pain, the feelings of our infirmities.

[20:34] You experience loss? He can be touched with that feeling. And he's telling you, come and get some grace. Come and get some mercy. He said there, it's grace to help.

[20:48] It's what he wants to do in time of need. Back in 2 Corinthians 12 is where Paul talked about his thorn in the flesh. He talked about his weakness in that time.

[20:59] But what he found was the grace of God was sufficient for him. And what he found was that the power of Christ rested upon him. And that he was strong.

[21:11] When he was weak, he was strong. He was going to the throne. He was getting what he needed. While there's an immediate impact from the storm and the crisis, the response believer is to get to the throne of grace.

[21:27] Complaining and crying and getting angry might feel good for a moment, but it doesn't help the situation. And it doesn't lift you up. What you must do is go to God.

[21:38] And let him lift you up. And let him pick you up. Because it might sound crass, but it's so true.

[21:50] These Egyptians lost a lot, but they still had a family to feed. They had to get up. They had to clean up the mess. They had to find a path forward. And when you hit a crisis, you need to learn to go to God and find a path forward.

[22:07] And find a way for him to give you the strength and clean the mess up and put one foot in front of the other. Don't let it be an excuse to knock you out of your race. So there's an immediate impact in this storm, and that's the crisis.

[22:22] But then let's see something else back in Exodus 9. As I want to show you, there's an emotional effect. There's an emotional effect, and we see this on Pharaoh because in verses 27 and 28, he says a few things.

[22:37] A little bit shocking to us as we read if we know this hard heart Pharaoh. In verse 27, Pharaoh sent and called for Moses and Aaron and said unto them, I have sinned this time. The Lord is righteous, and I and my people are wicked.

[22:54] Well, amen, Pharaoh. Amen to that. Good testimony. Good testimony, he had to say there before Moses and Aaron. He's right on the money.

[23:05] The Lord is righteous, and you are wicked, and your people are wicked, and you deserve this storm and this crisis. And so Pharaoh has a response, a confession.

[23:21] There's a crisis, and then there's this confession. It's an emotional effect, though. We have to understand that as I explain this. He had never in all of his life experienced this kind of devastation.

[23:32] Never has he seen it this bad. And so Pharaoh, he's been ignoring an awful lot, dealing with an awful lot, turning and going back to his house the one time with all the blood and with the plagues on the beast and the boils, and he's just hard, hard, hard, and all of a sudden he says, oh, entreat for me.

[23:55] It is enough. Verse 28, it's enough. I'm done. I give up. Talk to your God for me. He has a response.

[24:08] He's forced to react, though, because it's too much. He's never seen it like this before. I think it's overwhelming. The land, his own land, looks like he's just been destroyed by B-52 bombers for the whole weekend.

[24:26] There's nothing good going on. It's complete destruction. This isn't the first plague. It's not the first time he called for Moses and Aaron to come to his place.

[24:41] It's not the first time he asked them to entreat the Lord. It's not the first time he said he'd let the people go. So is he serious? It's the first time he says he's a sinner.

[24:53] It's the first time he's acknowledging God being righteous. Earlier he said, I know not the Lord. Now he says the Lord's righteous. So what's happening here? Well, it turns out it's just an emotional response to the national crisis, to the big, big situation in front of him.

[25:15] And such a time of distress, as I said earlier, it can be a shock to the system. And it can cause you to think differently. I'll give you an example. Many of you, if you've been, if you're probably, I don't know what, 30 years old, or older, you have a memory, back in 2001, September 11th, some crisis, shocked the nation.

[25:43] I mean, that's 2001. That's going back pretty far. But it shocked the nation, and you remember where you were. You remember the news. You remember the outcome.

[25:54] And what happened was the immediate response, the emotional effect of the crisis was that week, I don't know what it was like out here, but where I was, the churches were flooded.

[26:07] Our church was packed. It was reported and documented on the news everywhere that churches, people were showing up in record number to church this weekend. Why?

[26:18] Because they were scared. Because our nation, what's going to happen? And so they flooded the churches. Americas wanted to pray.

[26:30] Americans wanted to seek God for a week or two. For a week or two. You know what happened after a week or two?

[26:44] Our president put together a military campaign. And when he put together this announcement of how we're going to address these terrorists, Americans shifted from seeking God to supporting the men and women of the armed forces.

[27:04] And now being patriotic was the thing to do. Not be spiritual, be patriotic. And let's go get them. And let's wave the flags and let's put them in our yards and let's show our support.

[27:16] And the prayers and the church attendance disappeared. A week or two. What was it? Just an emotional response.

[27:29] Oh God, we need you. You're righteous. We're wicked. What? Oh, let's go let's go bomb them to death.

[27:41] And we're done with God. Did the word of God get back into the schools? Did the teachers open with prayer? Did they keep teaching that God doesn't exist?

[27:53] Yeah. You know what there was not? There was not repentance. None. There was an emotional response. That's all it was.

[28:06] And you experienced it. You saw it and lived through it. It's a huge problem. Because emotions run hot and then emotions cool off quickly. They're fickle.

[28:17] And understand this, get this, emotions are not a true indication of your heart's condition. They are not the true indicator of what's in your heart.

[28:29] Pharaoh's heart was hard. But he responded to what was in front of his face. You know what though? His response was just to something he could feel. It was just skin deep.

[28:40] It never got down. This fear never got to his heart. This belief of a righteous God never got to his heart. His own personal sin before that God never got down deep where it needed to be.

[28:53] It was just an emotional response. And when the heart is not affected, you can remain hard even when your emotions run high. I want to read you.

[29:04] Would you please turn again? I want you to turn back to 2 Corinthians this time, chapter 7. Here's a passage that I want to look at and kind of dissect on this point of repentance and its effect versus an emotional response.

[29:18] In 2 Corinthians 7, this is the second epistle to this church at Corinth. The first epistle was not a pretty one.

[29:33] As a matter of fact, the first epistle, Paul said, you're a bunch of carnal babies. That's what you are, church. And he said, there's total confusion.

[29:44] Things are out of order. You're allowing some filthy sin and sinner in your midst, in your congregation, and you're putting up with it. And he just, one point after another, reamed them out in the first epistle.

[29:59] And now, the apostle Paul, he's got himself as normal. He's in a bind. He's in a bad spot somewhere else in the world trying to serve God. But he gets word that the church at Corinth responded to his letter in the right way.

[30:15] They sorrowed over their condition and they repented of it. And they didn't get mad at Paul, but rather, they thanked him. And so let's read this passage here as he describes that in his response then to their response.

[30:33] I'll start all the way back. Oh, verse number four. He says, great is my boldness of speech toward you. Great is my glorying of you. I am filled with comfort.

[30:44] I'm exceeding joyful in all our tribulation. For when we were coming to Macedonia, our flesh had no rest. We were troubled on every side, without were fightings, within were fears.

[30:54] Nevertheless, God, that comforted those that are cast down, comforted us by the coming of Titus and not by his coming only, but by the consolation wherewith he was comforted in you.

[31:05] when he told us your earnest desire, your mourning, your fervent mind toward me so that I rejoice the more.

[31:18] Do you see that while Paul is in tribulation in Macedonia? He hears word of how the church at Corinth responded to his harsh tone and he's happy now.

[31:30] This has given him a little bit of energy to deal with his problem. He's comforted hearing that. You know what's disconcerting is when you hear, well, they're done.

[31:42] They quit. They gave up. They're mad. But no, he hears they responded. Here it goes. Verse 8, For though I made you sorry with a letter, I did not repent, though I did repent.

[31:56] For I perceive that the same epistle hath made you sorry, though it were but for a season. Now I rejoice, not that you were made sorry, but that ye sorrowed to repentance.

[32:09] For ye were made sorry after a godly manner that ye might receive damage by us and nothing for godly sorrow. Worketh repentance to salvation not to be repented of.

[32:21] But the sorrow of the world worketh death. Understand, he's not referring to their salvation of their souls, but rather the deliverance from the mess they were in on many fronts.

[32:36] And their sorrow toward his warning and epistle, it worked a repentance in them to salvation. They're already believers.

[32:46] Understand that. They're already saved. They didn't lose it. It was a deliverance from the sin, the guilt. And here's the verse. Verse 11. Here's something special here.

[32:59] When repentance is there, when it gets down inside. Verse 11. For behold this self same thing that ye sorrowed after a godly sort.

[33:10] What carefulness it wrought in you. You know Paul says that you guys care now. You care.

[33:21] You know how I know? Well, it's because you took it serious and you cleaned it up. You didn't say whatever you think you're better than. No, you took my words serious and my reproof and my rebuke to you and you made some changes.

[33:38] And it shows you care. What carefulness it wrought in you. Yea, what clearing of yourselves. That's an incredible thought. He says it again in the last part of that verse.

[33:50] Yea, what indignation. Yea, what fear. Yea, what vehement desire. Yea, what zeal. Yea, what revenge.

[34:02] I'll add yea, what language of the King James Bible in this verse. What revenge. They got their revenge. It was on themselves. It was on their own sins and their condition, their carnality.

[34:15] And when they were confronted, when the crisis was evident, they responded with sorrow to repentance.

[34:26] And they cleared themselves. They got it right. They dealt with it. There was sorrow over their sin. It wasn't an emotional response.

[34:38] It wasn't skin deep. But it got down into their heart and all of that language displays it. A clearing of themselves. The desire they have now. The care they have now.

[34:49] For doctrine. For doing things decently and in order instead of the confusion. For following the word of God. And so it's a huge problem when it's just an emotional response.

[35:03] Because that doesn't get down to the heart. But when there's repentance, there's a clearing. Let's see one more thing back in Exodus 9. We've got to wrap it up. Exodus chapter 9.

[35:16] We saw firstly there's an immediate impact from the storm. A crisis was on their hands. There's an emotional effect we see from Pharaoh. His confession.

[35:28] But it's only skin deep. And we know that to be a fact because Moses responds in verse 30. He says, But as for thee and thy servants, I know that you will not yet fear the Lord God.

[35:41] I know you're not serious, Pharaoh. Seven plagues. Why would there be anything more? Doesn't that sound like the number of completion? Why couldn't seven be the last one?

[35:54] But Moses said, I know you're not serious. You know what? That's scary. To be able to see that in a man that says, the Lord's righteous. I'm a sinner. And to know they don't mean business.

[36:08] There's cause for concern here. Real cause for concern. Because this emotional response is not a long-term fix.

[36:20] It's not genuine. It's just a response to the tragedy. He knows this king's going to flake on his decision like he did before. He knows he's not going to commit to this.

[36:32] And what he knows then is there's going to be more plagues and more devastation. And ultimately, there's going to be a cry that's heard in the land of Egypt.

[36:42] A cry that's so grievous and so hurtful. It's never going to get fixed. It's going to be death of the firstborn. Moses knows, Pharaoh, king, you're not serious.

[36:56] And the concern is, you're going to get it worse. You're still hard. The crisis could have softened your heart. Could have made it tender to the Lord.

[37:08] You could have called out to God. But instead, you called for me to take it away. Just take it away. You could have turned your heart to the true God, your creator, and said, Lord, you are righteous.

[37:24] Lord, I am sinful. But no, he called for Moses to do that talking. Seeing Pharaoh and his servants as this chapter closes, the last two verses, they're hardened.

[37:38] They're hardened to fearing God. They're hardened to hearing his word. It's a huge cause for concern. How much more can these people take? Realistically, how much more can a people take?

[37:50] Seven plagues, and now there's three more to come? If I was an Egyptian, I'd like to think that I'd be concerned.

[38:01] I'd like to think that I'd start considering, what are we doing with these Hebrews still? How much more of this are we going to deal with? They don't know how badly it's going to end for them yet.

[38:13] But there's continuing concerns here. There's another concern, not just the hardened heart of Pharaoh, but there's also kind of a long-term effect here. We noticed in verse 31 that some of these crops were destroyed.

[38:29] The flax and the barley was smitten. You know, you don't rebound quickly when you lose an entire crop. That's a seasonal crop.

[38:40] And that crop is to sustain you for that season ahead while another one's in the ground and there's a rotation going. And what that tells me is when he destroyed all of those crops there, there's going to be probably a time of recession coming.

[38:57] You're not going to recover quickly from such a crisis, from such destruction. It's going to be a process going forward. You know what's worse than that though?

[39:08] All of those trees of the field were destroyed. Why? You're not going to have an orchard next season. You're not going to have any orchard next season.

[39:20] That's going to take years to grow that back up. There's a big-time recovery program that's going to have to be put in place to get over this thing. The concerns of this are continuous.

[39:35] They're not just in this season but moving on into the future years. A long-term effect. And the recession is going to be real and they're going to feel the effects of this for years to come.

[39:49] It's going to take some real time to get back on their feet. The concerns that we're seeing here is that the cleanup and the recovery has long-term implications. And I wonder, are these people even capable of rebounding and getting back on their feet after another setback such as this?

[40:07] The other concern is the king and their people, they haven't given in yet. They're still in the same place they started. No change, no repentance, and just more plagues to come.

[40:21] Now let's conclude this morning from this plague and try to make sense of this situation. Just a little quick summary for us to take home. When God allows tragedy, when he allows a crisis as it were, a trial to enter into your life, it is a great way for him to get your attention.

[40:44] That is exactly what should happen. It should not be an excuse for you to fight against him or to complain and be a victim to everybody in your life.

[40:54] But no, it is a way for you to learn to call on him. It should evoke a response in you that you humbly turn your eyes to heaven. The crisis should have you crippled and you should already be knocked down enough that it's easy to be humbled.

[41:16] You ought to be able to sit down. You ought to be able to carefully weigh the situation. You ought to be able to seek the Lord's guidance and seek what the right path forward is.

[41:31] I've been in spots here and there in my life as a young man and even in my life today. They come and go. There's little different crises that pop up.

[41:43] Little different storms that come that you just don't plan on or don't see coming. And the right decision every single time is to get on my face and say, Lord, you knew about this.

[41:57] You saw this. And I trust you. Now, how should I respond? What's the path forward? I want to walk with you.

[42:10] I wish you didn't do this. I wish everything was fine. And yet it's not. And so you sit down and you weigh the situation.

[42:26] The work of crisis is to humble you and cause you to be willing to make any necessary change in your life and to commit, I might add, to commit to following through with those changes by his strength.

[42:40] That is a big problem when it's just an emotional response. There's no commitment to following through. It's, I just want this fixed and then I'll go back to my life. But that's not why the crisis is there.

[42:54] That's not why the storm's there. The humbling is to get you to fall on your face before God and to let it get down into your heart and to commit to following through with his path forward.

[43:07] Finally, when there's no repentance, there's no change. When there's no repentance, there's no change.

[43:19] And that's a real cause for concern. It makes me concerned when I see it in the lives of others. No repentance. And so I know you might have just survived it, but you haven't gotten anything right.

[43:35] and you're not seeking the Lord. And I know you're going to be in the same spot in a different way because there's going to be another plague coming because you didn't repent.

[43:50] You're not seeking the Lord. It's a cause for concern. More correction is going to be necessary for God to get your attention. So I admonish you, believer, when the storm comes, fall on your face, get to the throne of grace, get mercy, get grace to help.

[44:12] But by the grace of God, let that sorrow work repentance. Repentance that will cause you to clear yourself. Oh, it doesn't fix your life, but it clears you and it gives you a path forward.

[44:27] It shows the God you care. The storms have a way of humbling you and it's good. It's a good thing. We need it. David said, it's good for me that I have been afflicted. It's good.

[44:39] It hurts, but it's good. It can restore your focus on what's right and on what's needed. And so let's close there with that as we finished that chapter nine and that seventh plague.

[44:52] and Lord willing, we'll pick it up next week in chapter 10 and continue moving forward with this mess going on, this confrontation between God and Pharaoh.

[45:04] And there's so much to learn from this. And this morning, when the crisis comes, the storms, we like to call them, you saw a bad one. Maybe you've been in a bad one.

[45:15] Maybe you got a bad one coming. You better learn how to get on your face. You better learn how to get real with God and don't trust your emotions. Don't trust the quick response with tears.

[45:29] It's got to get deeper than that. Stay on your face till you know it's real, till you hear the voice of God putting peace in your heart. Spend some time with him. He'll mend it up.

[45:40] Then you'll start to feel the mercy come and the grace will start to get in. And then you'll be able to get up and start doing right. So it takes time on your face.

[45:51] Let's be dismissed with that. We're not going to have an invitation at all. I'm just going to close with that and send you on your way. But may God use that thought to help you and to grow you in the word of God.

[46:02] Let's pray. Lord, it is our prayer that you'll receive glory and that you'll receive a humble response from us when you send things into our life. We watch here week after week.

[46:15] A man with a hard heart. And Lord, the pride that's in us will do the same thing to us. And Lord, we beg your forgiveness. We plead for your mercy. We pray the blood of Christ would cleanse us and that you'd be gentle with us.

[46:32] And Lord, as you humble us in your mercy and you afflict us with storms, teach us to turn to you and to walk with you and to seek you and trust you.

[46:43] give us the courage and the strength to be committed to following your way. Lord, let us not lean onto our own understanding.

[46:54] Let us not seek help from man. Lord, show yourself mighty, close, and powerful as we deal with the crises throughout this life.

[47:07] please strengthen each believer. Draw us to the Lord Jesus Christ. Please be with our brother and sister as they're here in the paperwork and situations going on.

[47:22] I pray that you'll guide them to the right personnel and expedite this process and allow them to be a blessing while they're here and others to minister to them while they're here in the States.

[47:34] I pray for the souls of Cambodia, for the calling you've put on their hearts and lives. Help them to minister effectively. Give them strength and protection. Give them zeal and care and desire to see those souls saved and to do whatever it takes serving our Savior.

[47:51]  We love you. We love you because you first loved us. It's in Jesus Christ's name we pray. Amen. This morning, amen, you are dismissed. this.