Published: September 25, 2025 | Speaker: Chuck Hartman | Series: Biblical Theology 2 - Exodus, Exile, and Eschatology - Part 6 | Scripture: Exodus 14:1-31
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So, if you if you read the notes from last week, you you understand how I'm approaching the 10 plagues um looking um looking as it were uh beyond and above the
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terrestrial battle that was going on in in Egypt between Pharaoh and his magicians and Moses and Aaron um who were collective ly merely instruments of
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of higher powers. Um, and and I do firmly believe that, but I'm I'm certainly open to any questions or disagreements from that perspective.
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Does does anybody feel like, you know, we talked last week about the dangers of typology falling into allegory, of the dangers of typology divorcing
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itself from the actual history? And I I don't think we've gone that far. Certainly, there's no denial that these things denial. Sorry about that. Um
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there's there's no denying that these things actually happened along the Nile. Um that this is actual history. And in fact, those who uh take away its history
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take away its meaning. that that's really the the emphasis that Patrick Fairbar makes in his typology of scripture. And that is if you do divorce it from the historical event, you you
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take away the meaning and and now you have nothing nothing but myth and legend and really nothing to to hang your hat
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Well, there's a great number since the since the Enlightenment, the the vast majority of professing Christendom denies the actual historicity of these
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events. They they deny that Moses wrote these books for starters and they deny that any of these things actually happened, but they still find meaning in it. that
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that's the irony or the the um uh pathos of of what happens in liberal Christianity is they still want to find meaning in these myths. So they still
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write commentaries on Exodus but they don't believe any of this actually happened. These are just stories that were made up by later Jews uh in terms of a uh forming a an origins story for
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their people. So that's what I mean by divorcing it from the the history. Now origin we talked about him second century Alexandria
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he he basically acknowledged the history but dismissed it as simply not nothing more than children's stories that the deeper meaning is what we
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should be always looking for. So he didn't deny that these things actually happened but he gave no credence to the fact that they did happen. But what Fairbaron is saying and and
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what I'm maintaining is that it's the fact that these things happened that gives us confidence that what they foretold what they
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typified has also happened. If if these things, you know, never happened, if they're nothing but myth, then we have no foundation or framework
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for the way the New Testament writers use the Old Testament referring and and the the argument is, well, they were just men of their own culture. And in that culture, being benited and
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superstitious as it was, they believed these things actually happened. And so therefore, Jesus believed they actually happened. Jesus believed that there was actually a Moses who wrote the Pentatuk.
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You see where I'm what happens is if if this is true, why are you writing commentaries? Can't you do something better with your life than than write commentaries about
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something you don't believe? But that's what you get in even sadly a fair amount of conservative Christianity today in academia pretty much has embied the
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documentary hypothesis and the multiple authors of Isaiah.
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you again I think you have to go back to the bedrock that God has revealed himself in and through history. History remains important. remains important. Now keep in mind that another aspect of
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the enlightenment in kind of background to this was to essentially deny history as having any
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meaning. And now we we hear people that you know well history is not accurate. History is just somebody's perspective and even original sources aren't really accurate. We can't trust them. you. So that's
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that's now pervasive in the in the historical studies. Well, Christian history has suffered and Jewish history has suffered the same thing. And that is there's there's no real um
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what what was oh
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leings's ugly ditch the the vast chasm the the insuperable chasm between the contingent truths of history and the eternal truths of reason. Is that right?
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Does that sound right? Does that sound okay? It's not okay but I mean that that was uh um got something leing can't remember um
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German uh philosopher from the 18th century and it's called blessing's ugly ditch that there that there's this that divorce really this chasm has separated
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between what he calls the contingent truths of history meaning we really didn't know that any of that stuff actually happened and so those truths are not real truths, but the the eternal truth of reason.
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Now, that's the product of the enlightenment. That's where we are today. We are enamored of our own ability to reason things. So, when you approach the scriptures and you look at
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the 10 plagues, for example, and and the deliverance, well, deliverance, well, most professing Christians, especially in academia, but also in many pulpits,
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don't believe that any of that stuff actually happened. They don't even believe that it was written anywhere near the time that it was supposedly happening. It was written much later. It might have used old myths and legends
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that had been handed down, but it was actually collated and edited sometime during the exile or even after. So at that point, um, what Fairbon is saying
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is if you if you start from that position, you can end up anywhere. But we have Wouldn't that mean that all history? Well, that's what is generally held. I
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mean, it's it's it's hard to deny events certainly events in living memory. It's hard to deny events even in
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the past the past 1500 years because the documents are so abundant. Um but then those documents are then I
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mean there there's there the the danger is there's a bit there's a bit of truth in there. I mean Churchill said um history will be kind to me for I will write it and someone else said that that
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the the um history is written by the victors. You know history's history is written by those who win not by those who lose. So there is certainly bias. If
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you read Josephus, for example, you can you can see the bias. There's there's bias in history. There's agenda in history, but that doesn't mean we we throw out the whole thing and say that
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that that the facts of history are merely contingent. They're they're of no no real lasting value because they're a matter of perspective. Okay? And that's how people treat Christianity today. If
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you are one of those fundamentalist cooks that actually believes that God created the heavens and the earth and believes that there was a Moses and that all these things that we're reading about actually happened, well, you're
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not scientific. You're not enlightened. You're you're not modern. Um, so I want to just continue to establish that even though I'm looking at things
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that most certainly are are um behind the text. So for example, in the notes I mentioned the goddess Smed.
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You don't see that name in the text anywhere except you do see in several places regarding the Passover the name
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destroyer. And it's very interesting in terms of the sovereignty of God and also in light of for example the book of Job that God says on the night of Passover
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that that he would pass over the homes that had the blood on the doorposts and would not allow the destroyer to enter.
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So there's almost a well not almost there's there's actually a an um an equivalence. Thank you. between God himself. Now, God isn't the destroyer.
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What he's saying is he's using and and I think that's how it's been classically understood is that there was a destroying angel. In fact, I think some English Bibles actually say that, though
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that's not true to the text. The word is um is actually a Hebrew for destroyer. And it is actually the same word that that derives from the word sed or the
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the name that was given to the Egyptian goddess Sakmed. she was a she was the destroyer. So, I do think there's there's connection there that what's behind the the involvement of the magicians, what's behind what we're
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seeing in the actual text and we can envision in our minds is is a much greater battle going on. And I guess what I'm asking is does anybody have a problem with that perspective that there
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was something going on beyond what was going on on the ground?
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Yeah. I mentioned that. I mentioned that in the notes that that that's an example of the back when we talked about the holiness of objects the the idea of of God's holiness being so that the the the
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other Levites were not even allowed to look upon the articles of the of the holy place lest they die. They had to wait until they were covered even though they were Levites. And and then also the
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other example is is Deeon that um clearly something was going on there that God was it was not the statue that fell over. It was the idol that the
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statue symbolized that was falling down before the true God and and then being destroyed by him. And I think that's what we're we're going to see tonight as we look at the crossing of the Red Sea
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is that that battle is continuing. And I think it's important because it sheds light to me at least on a number of New Testament passages
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that reference Old Testament events, but also passages that speak of Christ defeating the powers and principalities
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making public display and leading them in triumph. His battle was his battle was not against flesh and blood as ours is not.
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is not. But certainly we live in an age where very little said about those things and many don't even want to they don't want to think about those things because it's
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frightening. Uh to me if we rehearse many times the truth that god is ultimate and there is no other god then those things should not frighten us. And again, as I
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referenced last week with the Screw Tape Letters, I think part of the genius of Lewis in that um that little book is to to kind of uncover the schemes of of
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which we are not unaware, Paul says, of the deceiver. And the greatest deception that Satan could ever perpetrate, so says Lewis in this book, is to convince
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people that he doesn't exist. that that is I think that's um undeniably the greatest deception that Satan could pull off is to get us to
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deny his existence. And in a way we do when we simply I don't know uh make like Sunday school stories out of what we're reading rather than realize that that Passover
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night was a night of great death. tremendous lamenting as no household was left untouched by the destroyer.
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yet that didn't work. The the night the 10th plague is actually a double header. And and I don't think we when you know when we have the list of the 10 plagues
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we always end with the death of the firstborn. But that was actually itself a composite. That last event did not result in the deliverance of
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Israel. It simply resulted in the preservation of the firstborn of Israel. But it did not actually effectuate their
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deliverance. God still had something else he was going to do, something completely massive. Um, and and uh he even says early on that none of these pl he
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basically tells Moses, none of these plagues are going to work. Pharaoh will harden his heart and I will harden Pharaoh's heart. And then Paul tells us in Romans 9:1 17, why?
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That my glory may be known in all the earth. So, this isn't even about, as as I quoted someone in the notes last week, this is not even about or just about
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delivering Israel. delivering Israel. Nothing is ever about just about us. The whole thing, including our salvation and Israel's deliverance, is about the
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glory of God. That's what he says. And he says it over and over. For my name's sake, I'm going to do this, not for yours. in Ezekiel 36, I'm not doing this
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for you. I'm doing it for my name's sake. Okay? And Deuteronomy 7 when he chooses Israel, he says, "You are not the greatest. You are not the largest, but because of my love, I'm doing these
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things. I have chosen you." So when we look at these things, we we tend being in a in a very individualistic and me centered culture,
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centered culture, we do tend to marvel at what God did for Israel. and and we tend to make that application that what God did for Israel, he's doing for me or and we might even be bold enough to say he's
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doing for us, but we don't fully understand what it was he was doing. And if we don't understand what we what he was doing, we really don't understand what's truly stacked up against us.
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Which means we diminish the value and magnitude of what he has done for us by diminishing what was arrayed against us. As Paul
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says in Colossians, that certificate that was against us, that indictment that he took and nailed to the cross. But how he did it, Paul says, is by
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making a spectacle of the powers and principalities and the rulers. Not Pilate, not Caiaphas, but Satan and his
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minions. And that's what Jesus said before he went to the cross. He said, you know, the the prince of this world is coming and he has nothing in me. And he says
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when when they came out into the garden and he says, why did you come out in the night with swords and clubs? I'm in I'm in the temple every day. and he says, "This is your hour and the hour and the
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power of darkness." So, see those kind of phrases throughout peppered throughout the New Testament tell us this is a bigger thing than just saving some people from their sins. That that's
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a wonderful thing, but I don't think God um how do I put it? I don't think God
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how little thought we give to what he has really done on our behalf. Sometimes I I think
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perhaps that God might think that we think what he did was not all that big a deal. You know, he's he's holy. He's loving. He forgives. That's what God does.
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This was not just that. This was a uh this was a clash of titans. This was this was a huge and is a huge battle that is ongoing. Though the victory has
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been secured in the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ.
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Exodus. Yes, the Psalms ref the Psalms definitely speak in Exodus language. And what what I try to show from Isaiah 43 um is that everything that is spoken of
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yet in the future is still spoken of in Exodus language. So Isaiah in chapter 43 is speaking of a redemption from a future exile because he's several
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hundred years before that. But he's speaking using references to the Exodus. And then even when he talks about the Exodus, he uses language that is reminiscent of creation. Now, when you
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when you read that, that's biblical theology. You're hearing the echoes. You're recognizing the language that when something happens, when God acts, he's not only delivering, he's not only
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giving law, he's actually giving, as it were, he's giving a language in which the rest of his revelation will now be couched and framed. So as we go
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through the Exodus and we're taking some time here because it is it I think clearly um considering the Hebrew scriptures which are then the foundation
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of the Christian scriptures if we look at it that way the Hebrew scriptures are very much rooted in the Exodus.
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no we don't right in western civilization what we're talking about hasn't been spoken much of in a long long time. We we I just uh taught my my history class.
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We just went through the Salem witch trials. I don't think such a thing could even happen today. And I think we got have a lot more witches today in government than we than we had in in the whole colonies back then. But we don't
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even believe that stuff anymore. Um and and um Abigail teaches uh medieval and early modern history. And the basic attitude of both the writers and the
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students is, well, this stuff didn't really happen. really happen. These things that they saw, they didn't really see them. Well, they sure thought they did, you know. And we we hear
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sometimes of missionaries who experience things in third world nations that we think that didn't really happen. They're just smoking something. See, we we deny
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it. No, and I don't think I I think that that is actually a signal victory for Satan. that he doesn't need to do that stuff anymore. In fact, if we if we, as Paul says, are aware of his schemes, he
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would be foolish to do that stuff again. Once you've convinced a culture of the non-existence of an of a spiritual realm, much less an evil one, I mean, we
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we all have enough strategic sense to know you've won the battle. Don't mess it up by actually doing weird stuff, right? actually having demon possession
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and the stuff that we read about in scripture which is still part of the life of many non-industrialized non-modern countries and cultures in the
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world today. Yeah. So, does that mean that this isn't true because we don't believe it anymore? Well, again, if you believe that, then you've just fallen into the enlightenment rut of the the um the
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ultimacy of reason.
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right? think of it. We don't think of it that way. So strong So strong and and yet obviously God is so strong that he could just okay by one word.
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However, I believe that's why the magicians were able to duplicate some of the the magic to show that there is power in this
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that though they have no ultimate power and their power is derived not ultimate and they are under the sovereign providence of God as we see in the book of Job where even Satan himself is
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subject to the permission of God. Okay. So there there are forces they're called powers and authorities and
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principalities meaning they have they have jurisdictions have jurisdictions they have um you know the same word that Jesus uses when he says in Matthew 28 basically alluding to Daniel 7 the son
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of man came before the ancient of days and all power and authority was given to him. Well that's what Jesus says in Matthew 28. All authority has been given unto me in heaven and earth. So that
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that's real. And the powers and principalities of which the scriptures speak are also real. Now I am personally thankful that we
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don't have visible manifestations of that. I think in my life I've only seen it a couple times and it gave me the heebie-jebies. I did
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not like it. And the when I walked away from it, I felt like if that wasn't demon possession, I have no idea what it might look like, but it was very unsettling
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and and and um very unnerving and I am glad. I would not want to live in a culture. So, okay, that means we we
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don't pay any attention to it at all. We give no glory to God for having defeated these powers through Jesus Christ. and we don't recognize it's like um I don't know, you know, it's like a general
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coming home from from winning a a major battle, a huge battle, and and the rest of the society just kind of ignoring him and and saying, you know, it wasn't all
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that big a deal. I mean, you're all powerful. What's it to you? No, I I don't think that's the way God wants us to react when we read
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these things. I don't think he wants to just see it as God versus Pharaoh, but really it's Moses versus Pharaoh and God versus Satan.
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And there's a there's a bigger battle. And I think as we look at this double header of the of the 10th plague and realize that the Passover and the death of the firstborn was only the first game
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of the double header. And even in the text, God tells Moses, "Pharaoh won't let you go. He will pursue you. as God was raising up Pharaoh to bring
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glory to himself and to to culminate to climax this entire episode in such a way that the almighty power of God over the gods
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of Egypt was unquestioned and that's the crossing of the sea. Now the the the pathetic nature of
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modern commentary is when you turn to Exodus 6, no, not those are plagues. Um 12 14 14, the
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crossing of the sea, the most ink is spilled on trying to determine exactly where they crossed.
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I don't care. It was wet. Not for them, okay? But it it's really pathetic. Very few commentators ever bother to actually
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delve into what God was doing here. There's a perfectly good route to get out of Egypt to Canaan. It's called the Way of the Sea. It's up
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by the Mediterranean. It's where all the caravans went. That's how Joseph got down there. That's how they took the boat, the body of of Jacob back. You
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know, that was the way to go. And in fact, it's not far from Gan where the Israelites lived. It would have been few days journey.
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days journey. But God But God God didn't intend that. He had he had not finished with Pharaoh because he had not finished with Satan.
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And so tonight we're going to be looking at the crossing of the sea. Lord willing, next week we'll look at um the Passover. Um and we have a couple more weeks and I'm going to take a few weeks off. We're
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going to be going out of town over Milton's fall break. So I want to have another week before that to do more study and preparation. But um what I hope to do is is um Passover
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next week and then actually take a long look at circumcision which would seem to go back either to Abraham but it's it's interesting just
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to kind of hopefully wet your appetites. It appears that, well, not appears, it is the fact that when Joshua led the children across the Jordan, which by the
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way was split, they went across on dry ground. Okay? It's actually, I hate to say this after the Sunday school, this is actually a kayazm
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sea. In Joshua, we have crossing the sea and The Passover had not been celebrated for 39 years.
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39 years. It had only been observe observed once in the wilderness, the beginning of the second year. And the entire generation
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that had come out of the wilderness had not been circumcised. Now that screams what's going on, okay?
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What's going This is Moses who already found out, you know, with his wife Zipper and his son. He found out how important circumcision is, right? Because the Lord was there to kill him.
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Um, so this is under Moses. The entire generation is not circumcised. And Joshua has them circumcised after the crossing of the Jordan.
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The circumcision is very much tied up in this, but it's also tied up in such a manner with all of this that I think for me conclusively
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proves that Christian baptism does not take the place of circumcision. of circumcision. So, that's where we're headed with these next few weeks. And hopefully by the end
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of that, we'll we'll all be absolutely confirmed Baptists. confirmed Baptists. um and and thinking Baptists too. Um not just saying that it has to be immersion but understanding what baptism means. So
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let's take a look then is this double header. Okay. So um the the death of the firstborn was not the end of the story. That's kind of the the the takeaway to start here. um is that
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is the death of the firstborn and Passover, the night of death. But part two is the um crossing of the sea.
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And and I'm saying that these
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together represent the redemption of Israel from bondage. Not the one and not the other because they're they're
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they're they're They are integrally tied together both in the texts that we're reading in Exodus but also by Paul in 1 Corinthians 10 which Lord willing we'll we'll get to
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this evening. So together
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Well, because it all happened that night and the Passover. So it's it's what happened that night. the the plague, the 10th plague was the death of the firstborn of Egypt. That was the plague,
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right? But the deliverance was the blood on the doorpost in lentil and the Passover. So the Passover meal is part of that 10th plague. In fact, it's the only
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plague in which the Israelites themselves were to participate. They were to do something. they were to obey a particular command
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and perform a particular ritual as part of that night. So I I think the text inner if you read the it's it's
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interwoven the Passover and then what God's going to do to the firstborn and then the Passover as a memorial. It's it's interwoven. It's it's alternating
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paragraphs. It's not just here's the Passover now the death of the firstborn and then all the Israelites leave. It's not how it's written. it's written. Does that make sense?
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Passover. Diminishing Passover.
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No, the these these two are are integally linked. integally linked. Passover and the death of the firstborn. That's all one that's all one plague. That's all one thing. Because there's only one destroyer going across during the night, one event. And the only thing
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that keeps the firstborn of Israel alive is the Passover blood. So it's they're they're the same story. Does that make sense? Yeah. They're they're not different. And actually, I'm I'm going
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to be not diminishing Passover, but raising up two other events that Paul
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raises up in 1 Corinthians 10. We're going to be talking about Passover next week and getting into more detail, but I'll I'll go ahead and give away a little bit of the punchline.
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We tend to associate the Lord's Supper with Passover with Passover because it occurred at the Passover. We we do we're all pretty much in agreement that that's when it occurred when the
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Lord did that. But actually in 1 Corinthians 10 when Paul is talking about the Lord's supper, he doesn't mention Passover at all. He mentions the
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mana and the water from the rock. So just kind of think about that. And in John six, John six, which is I think correctly associated
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with the meaning of the Lord's supper, Jesus also mentions the mana in the wilderness. He doesn't mention the water from the rock, but he mentions the mana.
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Okay? So, and not the lamb. So, um he speaks of himself as true bread, but of course, the Passover is meat. So, but
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the Lord's supper is not meat. it's bread. So there's a mixing of metaphors here. There's a depth of richness to the typology of the Lord's supper where it's
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coming from. But what I want to try to show is that biblically the Passover and the mana and the water
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from the rock are all associated with the crossing of the sea. the sea. They all occur before Sinai.
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So they're they're all kind of in the same chapters in Exodus. The mana in the wilderness, the water from the rock at Horeb. Okay, that's all in chapters 12 through
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17. They're all together before we actually get to Si. All right, so that's why I want to spend some time because this is the deliverance of of Israel. And yet Paul
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says not all Israel is Israel. of the fighting age men who departed from Egypt, only two crossed the Jordan into the promised land, Caleb and
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Joshua. And Paul says in 1 Corinthians 10, as the writer of Hebrews says in Hebrews 3 and Hebrews 4, with them God was not
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pleased and their bodies were laid low in the wilderness. So it's it's not all it is. and yet it's not. Okay, so bear with me. Come, you know,
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come with me as we walk through this, not not quickly u and look at these events. But Passover is an integral part of the night of the death of the firstborn. It
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it without that Passover, the destroyer would take the firstborn of Israel as well. I think that's right there in the
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text. And and that's interesting because God knows those who were his. Did God need to see that blood? Did he need to see that blood to know that Israelites were living in this
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house? Did he not know that there were Israelites living in that particular house? He knew. He knew all that, right? It's almost to me it's like that no, the Israelites needed to see that. They
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needed to see that. And what they really needed to see, and I mentioned this last week, and I'm going to go ahead and
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what they did, if you if you think about it, putting blood on their doorposts and lentils was rather macabra to begin with, if you think about it. I don't think Sherwin Williams sells that brand
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of paint. Okay. It's it's also now some people have tried to make an altar out of it like the spreading of of um the blood is the smearing of the blood on
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the altar in the tabernacle and and many reformed uh commentaries will try to make altars and then tabernacles of all the Israelites homes. I think that's
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anacronistic. I think that's reading back into an earlier event, something that would become practice somewhere else. and and particularly it was not to be done in the homes.
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It was to be done in the in the sanctuary when we read Leviticus. Okay. So, um I don't I don't really buy that. I don't think they're correct. I think what we're dealing with here again, I
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think it does tie in very much to the nature of that particular Egyptian goddess Smedsatiable goddess Smedsatiable in terms of blood. Remember I I
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mentioned last week the story of the destruction of humanity. you know that the other other gods were so upset by her rampage that they concocted a scheme of of dying beer red so that it would
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look like blood and Sekhmed apparently drank it up like the Nile and got drunk and fell asleep and the and the carnage ended. Okay. Uh I would think that with the hangover she ended up with she might
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go back on the rampage. But so it's a very silly story. As I mentioned last week, she can't tell the difference between the taste of beer and and blood. It's kind of goofy, but the point being is that blood actually is her domain.
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And so, in in a sense, and and some of the older commentaries, especially the ones that emphasize the um uh the the archaeology, as it were, of what's going on in Egypt at the time, make the
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comment that this might have been very frightening for many of the Israelites. And I'm going to quote one of them. Um, he says, "God's instruction to smear blood on the lentils and doorposts
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likely plunged idol worshiing Israelites into shock and fear. After all, blood was the very substance that would attract the murderous seedmed to them."
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And yet, God was beating Sekmet at her own game. own game. That that it was actually the blood of the lamb that would preserve the firstborn of those homes.
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So, um, it's it's really kind of a picture of how Jesus himself defeats the one who has the power of
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death through what? right? It shows God to be sovereign over even the particular powers of the demon world
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and even over death itself. But it also shows in a sense God's strategy that he's going to use that power to defeat
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the one who holds it, the one who has usurped it. So um that's why I'm saying it's very very important to keep in my opinion it's very important to keep the death of the firstborn and the Passover
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together because there there are two sides of one event. There's a there's a judgment and condemnation side and there's a deliverance and redemptive side of the same night. But that didn't
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finish the story because God had already said in Genesis in Exodus 12, Pharaoh will pursue you even after this night when he kicks you
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out. But then God actually effectuates that pursuit by having the children of Israel Israel wander as if their GPS
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went out. went out. And if you read the you read it, they're like, "Oh, we'll go here. No, we'll go there." Okay. And they're just wandering around in the wilderness. And Pharaoh
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goes, "They're lost. I got them now." And God has them trapped between Pharaoh and the sea. when there was a very easy way that I
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have no doubt Moses who was raised in the court of Pharaoh and then lived 40 years in Midian had no doubt that Moses knew the way by the sea. That was the
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caravan route. Everybody knew that. That's like you don't know where I 85 is and you go wandering around Highway 11. Okay. Right. For a motorcycle. Yeah. For the
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rest of us who actually want to get there before we die, it's, you know, not that great. Uh, but that's kind of an analogy is they're wandering around as if they have no idea where they're going when pretty much everybody knew the way
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to Canaan and the way to to Persia. It was the way of the sea. Okay. So, God is effectuating his own will by directing through the cloud. He's directing Israel
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to pin them against the sea. Now, that word see is what we talked about a little bit last week. And we're going to focus more on that tonight
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because when Moses says, "Stand back and behold the salvation of the Lord," he is not just talking about the destruction
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of Pharaoh's army. He's talking about the destruction of the ruler of the sea of Leviathan,
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of Leviathan, of the serpent, of the dragon of Rahab, which always confused me because there's Rahab in Jericho, right? Who who puts the red thread and she's and she gets
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married and she ends up in the lineage of David, which is the lineage of Christ. Like, that's kind of neat. Um, that's not the Rahab that that the prophets talk about and that the Psalms talk about. That Rahab is actually the
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sea demon. sea demon. Okay? The sea serpent, Leviathan that comes up in different names. Tiiamat in in ancient Egyptian mythology is this idea that the sea is controlled by the
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the the the ultimate force of evil which is why the sea has always been absolutely fearful to human beings for the most part.
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What's that they should put in a footnote? I think they what about Rahab? Yeah. Oh, I think so. Yeah. Yeah. I think if you look at the other uses of Rahab, you realize that that um no, this is this is something bigger than the the woman the
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h the hotel keeper in Jericho that it's unfortunate her name I mean it would be kind of like you know naming your son Diabolous you know I mean that's not really a good name to
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give the boy that kind of uh and it's a shame that she ended up being called Rahab but it's a it's just a coincidence that's not the Rahab you think God and Job God is the one who and he Rahab in
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half. Like, what's up with that? I mean, what'd she do to you? I mean, she hid the spies. What's wrong with Rahab? No, no, not the same person. This is this is
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a this is a motif and a theme that runs through the Old Testament and it it is it is integrally intimately um and inextricably linked with the sea.
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Okay. And it it is God who can who can draw out Leviathan with a hook from the sea. So the sea itself represents as I
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mentioned last week it represents evil. It represent conflict. Okay. And again the the ultimate I think proof of the biblical doctrine and this
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is actually the ancient neareastern doctrine and not just the ancient neareastern but pretty much in the ancient world. I mean, we have essentially we say we've conquered the sea, right? You know, we have GPS. Our
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ships are are almost unsinkable. You know, we thought we conquered the sea in 1912, didn't we? With the Titanic, you know, the unse the unsinkable ship that went down on our maiden voyage. And
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God's like, don't do that, guys. Come on. Don't don't give me a Jenny egg that way. It's like, really? Um, but we think we've conquered the sea, but no, we haven't conquered the sea. And in the
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new earth, there is no sea. Every reference to the sea that I can find in scripture is negative. It is the it is the source of all forms
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of evil, including in Daniel 7, the the kingdoms of the earth. They come out of the sea.
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Yeah. That even the winds and the waves obey him.
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Yeah. And walking on it. Um Yeah. And that see there's more to it than just uh the the fact that they were scared they were going to die. Um I don't know. I think among
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people's reflections on death, drowning in the sea historically is considered one of the most horrific
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uh and to the point that many naval officers rather than go down with the ship will shoot themselves. They will commit suicide rather than drown. There's just a I don't I don't
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like the sea. I don't know how you feel about it, but I I you know I'm with that woman says you go to the go to the beach, go to the beach. Don't go in the ocean. Um but when we look at this this
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this God is doing this on purpose. He is bringing Israel to a place where only his power can conceivably deliver them. And yet he doesn't do it in a way that
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we might think. He does put the pillar of fire between Israel and Pharaoh's army so that Israel has time to get across. But why didn't he just burn is
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uh Pharaoh's army? He could have disposed of Pharaoh's army quite easily like he did with Sakaribbs outside of Jerusalem, right? The the the lepers outside one morning they wake up and all
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this food on the table and no Assyrians alive. Let's go eat. Oh, you know, we better tell the people in the city. Um, that's a funny story to me. God could have destroyed. That wasn't the point.
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He was going to destroy Pharaoh's strength, his power. But there was another power he was going to destroy. And that is the power of the serpent of the sea, the power of the sea, which
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again biblically represents the power of the devil, the power of Leviathan or of Rahab or of any of the different names. um the dragon that we see in Revelation 12. These are all metaphors of the same
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being and that is the the the prince of the power of of the air, but also the the demon, the serpent of the sea. So,
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um, so God brings them to the the the shores of the sea, but he's doing again because he's doing a work that um
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that would that would just absolutely beyond a shadow of a doubt show his ultimate and absolute majesty. He divides the sea. And I think it's very interesting. They cross over on dry
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ground. But when the when Pharaoh's chariots begin to pursue, they get caught in the mire. So there's multiple miracles going on here, not just the dividing of the sea.
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But when the seas close in on Pharaoh's host, that destruction that destruction is more than simply the eradication of
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Pharaoh's army. Pharaoh's army. It is the destruction of Pharaoh as the serpent himself. serpent himself. Now, I'm not saying that Pharaoh was the
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devil, but I am saying that biblically, rulers of the nations that were most oppressive to Israel to Israel were most closely associated with the
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devil himself. So, for example, in Isaiah 13, Isaiah 13, we find that uh star of the morning, which is latinized into Lucifer,
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and you said to yourself, I will ascend to the most high, and I will make a name for myself. And God says, no, you will be cut down to the lowest hell.
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Okay? And everybody, and it's the king of Babylon. It's a prophecy against the king of Babylon. And most modern commentaries will not go any further than that. They will say, "Oh, no, no,
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no. This is just about the king of Babylon." Now, let me read it because I I want I want to, you know, ask you, do you really think this is only about the king of Babylon? That there's nothing more to it
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than the arrogance of a a Oh, I was wondering who we were listening to. listening to. All right. Um, what did I say? Here it
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is. Um, Isaiah 14 and let's see where does
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I see where it begins, but I'm okay. Verse four. You will take up this taunt against the king of Babylon and say, how the oppressor has ceased and how fury has ceased. Now he goes on about the
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Lord is breaking the staff of the wicked. Um and goes on and then in verse 12, how you have fallen from heaven, oh star of the morning, son of the dawn.
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You have been cut down to the earth. You have weakened the nations. But you said in your heart, I will ascend to heaven. I will raise my throne above the stars
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of God. And I will sit on the mount of assembly in the recesses of the north. I will ascend above the heights of the clouds. I will make myself like the most
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high. Nevertheless, high. Nevertheless, you will be thrust down to shol to the recesses of the pit. Is that the king of Babylon?
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Or I should say, is that just the king of Babylon? of Babylon? Who else is cast down cast out of Satan, you know, yes, it's the king of Babylon,
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but no, it's not just the king of Babylon. And and I think that's where typology has to be recovered in our reading of the Bible. Now, I I don't
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know, you may have never thought it was just the king of Babylon. I I think it's fairly It's kind of ironic that that's where we get the name Lucifer is from this passage. So, most of church history
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recognized that this wasn't just about the king of Babylon. Yes, in revelation where he's cast out and and actually Jesus in the gospels
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says behold after the you know when the disciple says we we in the in your name we were able to cast out demons and he says behold I saw Satan being cast down.
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Okay. So yeah it's it's a it's a it's a motif in scripture of Satan being cast down. I heard you know about
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Yeah. Again, that's where we get the name Lucifer. Um, so we recognize who this is, the the son of the dawn, the star of the morning. That puts us all the way back really to the beginning and and we recognize that he is he is a
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glorious being. glorious being. He he's so glorious that Jude tells us that even the archangel Michael refused to issue a railing judgment against him
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but rather said the Lord rebuke you. Okay. So uh you made the comment about the re a about the reality of of these um these are not beings that we would
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like to come in contact with on a regular basis like never would be you know and and I I remember from our days in the charismatic movement how blightly
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how flippantly how flippantly people would talk about taking on the devil. I don't even want to meet him frankly. I'm G. I'm standing behind the Lord on that one because every time I see
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anything that has anything to do with them, they they are awesome, powerful, and and fearsome creatures. John, somewhere in Isaiah described the devil as puny and weak. And was that the one
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that we were so scared of? Verse 16. Yes, that's that's ex Thank you. I I could have gone on because what will happen is after his humiliation, after his being cast down, his
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confederates now I think to some extent will returning to the king of Babylon. They will welcome him. Those that he had killed, those nations that he had conquered, he will join in death and in
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hell. And his power will be shown to be impotence and they will make fun of him. They will mock him. Okay. Now, I I think that the passage does as as many
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biblical passages do. It moves between the immediate context and the context that lies behind it. That's part of typology of recognizing that this is an
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oracle against the king of Babylon. But within that, it's also an oracle against the power that lies behind the king of Babylon, and that is Satan himself.
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Thank you, John.
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But even when he says I was thinking when he said get behind me Satan
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and right and and yet it shows the power of Satan because when he says I have prayed for you when you return strengthen your brothers he doesn't say If if you make it, Peter, strengthen your brothers. No.
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When when you're going to go through this, but I have prayed for you. See, it's not it's not kind of like we pray. I'm praying for you. When Jesus prays, and really same should be with us. But
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that that was not that was not meant to just comfort Peter. It was to assure him that he would come out on the other side. So, when we're when we're looking at um Pharaoh, I mean, Pharaoh Oh, Anna.
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I I think that that story has a whole lot more to it like you're saying. Um to to step out onto that water would have been horrifying, but it's also very highly symbolic. Um and and it it also
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shows that that Christ was Peter's sustenance. And so long as Peter kept his eyes on Jesus, he was unsinkable. Yeah. Yeah. Well, he the pope got a bath
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that night. Um so Pharaoh actually is is um in the time of the Exodus there there is no king of Babylon. I mean there is a Babylon,
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there's a Calaldia, there are but the the real power in the ancient near east is Egypt. And so the representative of of what we read here in Isaiah 14 about
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the king of Babylon, well that's
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Yeah. So, what that shows us to me, what that shows us, the fact that this imagery is woven in the scriptures, blending both the the human agents as well as the
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powers that lie behind them. That that's one of the major purposes of biblical theology is that all of this needs to be interpreted in the midst of the whole
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story. And yet if we limit that story like we so often do to just here on earth and even go further and to limit it just
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to human beings which I think Paul should dispel in Romans 8 where he talks about the redemption of creation. We we fail to see that this is a this is a big
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cosmic meta narrative of which we are a part and in Christ we are on the winning side. But the victory is not just against other human beings. It's not
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even against other human beings. It's against the powers and principalities and the forces of darkness in the heavenlies. And so every other conflict that we see in scripture is
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essentially cast in that mold. And every enemy of Israel is representative of the enemies of God
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in the heavenlies. Babylon, Ty, Pharaoh, and Egypt. So in in Ezekiel, since you mentioned Ezekiel,
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mentioned Ezekiel, so okay, let me let me just summarize where we are. So we're at the sea. Okay. So