Exodus 7:1–7Scripture
Exodus 7. Last week, although I kind of went rogue, I'm just going to recap in case you were not here last week. We talked about the prophet Amos and how he was speaking to the northern nation of Israel, and he was telling them that the Lord is sending a famine into that nation.
And if we get a more comprehensive view of the book, the entire prophecy and what is going on with the nation, he lays out in the entire prophecy in the book of Amos what he has done with the nation of Israel, what he is doing and what he will do, and the things that are to come, and his overall theme or purpose of how he intends to use the nation of Israel to not only bring in the Gentiles, but that people, when they see what he has done, would glorify his name forever, and that he would be worthy of that glory. And when they stood back and see how he has used them and what he has done with them, according to his will, according to his purposes, and ultimately according to his sovereign power and authority, they would be in awe of what he has done. But sometimes we only see the microcosm and we miss the macrocosm. Was that reversed? No, that's right, what I said. Because we see the little things, but we can't see the full picture. And when we go through life, the reality is we see the little things, but we have a hard time seeing the full picture of what God is working out in our lives. Therefore, we have a hard time glorifying him. Are you with me?
And so glory is befitting his name because it says it is, not because you feel it is.
Pastor Shawn Gray · 1:45
There are going to be many times you don't want to glorify the Lord. That's why our worship is hindered, and we have to worship and it becomes a sacrifice of praise, because we see the
Introduction
Little things but we don't see the big picture. News flash: he didn't give it to you, his life plan and how you fit in. What we can begin to do, let me help you, is we can see ourselves through the lens of the Gentiles, that God has created much opportunity for us to get in. And if he has called us, and he has fashioned us, and he has purposed us to be his, we will be his. And that ultimately is why we can glorify the Lord, that he has created and gone through painstaking measures to get his children in. So regardless of the little things you face day to day, many of us today are in, and that's worthy of praising him. Not worthy of his praise, but he is worthy of ours. Exodus 7:1–6. And I have been, I actually had this sermon prepared last week, went rogue to try to get us to a place where we understand that it is God who sends a famine where we can't hear. And so our prayer and our cry is that we would not hear, or that we would not hear something but not really hear what the Lord is saying to the church. That's our heart. And so we see this picture of God sending a famine, God opening ears, God doing that, and it's God's sovereign decision to do so. And he does it when he pleases, and he releases the hearing when he pleases. One day Jews will come in by the droves because he removes the famine and they hear the word, right? This is all a part of his plan. And we get a glimpse of what was, we get a glimpse of what is, and we get a glimpse of what is coming, and we hear this through the words of the prophet. Many stages of this prophecy have already been fulfilled, and this is one of the greatest books, because out of all the prophecies, they are being fulfilled.
There is no missing part to it. It is a beautiful book, it is a beautiful covenant, and it is wonderful. And then we get to hear today in this message. And I don't want us to not hear what the Lord is saying to the church, because everyone here is going to hear, but not everyone here is going to hear. Are you with me? Because we like to see and fashion a God who is dependent on our actions, so then God responds accordingly to how we behave. So if I love him, he loves me. If I trust him, then he blesses me. If I do what he says, then I'm going to get what I want. But the reality is God has a plan set in motion before your will showed up on the scene, amen? And his plan will come to fruition. His plan is his word and his bond, and when his word goes out, it accomplishes what he wants it to accomplish, not what you will it to accomplish. And it returns to him, and it does not return without accomplishing everything he intended for it to accomplish before you came here to earth. And so when we read this, we need to understand we are reading this, and I am
Point 1God is actively at work, not standing back
Definitely preaching this, through the lens of a theist. Let me explain to you, and I did this on the first sermon of Exodus, I'm going to remind you, because many of us are going to try to turn this into a deist text, not a theist text. A theist believes in God and believes that God is actively working out his purposes actively in our world today. He has not simply created the earth, stood back and let it do its thing. He is actively involved. In other words, if God decides, he has the whole world in his hands, or does he not? I mean, that's not a theologically grounded song necessarily, but if it's in his hands, and the earth is orbiting, and the sun is in the perfect proportion to the earth to warm it but not fry it, if all the galaxies and the stars are not colliding into each other, it is because God not only spoke but is speaking, and still holding everything together in this moment. If he takes his hands off, I would propose to you today, as a theist, somebody who believes he's actively involved, this whole thing would go haywire.
You are not in control. He is in control. He is actively, presently in control.
Pastor Shawn Gray · 6:55
When we read through Romans, we see a God who's actively working out his plan. We do not see a God that has simply painted a picture, set things in motion, and is letting it just do its thing. That's not how it's going. He's hardening hearts, he's sending men, he's commanding them what to say, he is sending plagues. Why? "Well, it's just the way the world is. Plagues came because of sin."
No, God's sending them because he's active. "Well, that seems like the boogeyman. Why would God be so mean? Why would he harden?" You can ask the question, but you don't get to redefine God. You can have a problem with how God moves and behaves and what he does, but you don't get to redefine him. And the reality is most people in the church, particularly in America today, they're not theists, they're deists. They believe that there is a God, but he is removed and he is not active and he doesn't harden hearts. They simply believe, "Well, sin came into the world, and so because sin is there, his heart is hardened, and God can't do anything about it. And it was Pharaoh that hardened his heart, and he's the only one who can do it." We're going to deal with that today, the struggle. But I want you to know the struggle is not the confusion of Scripture. The struggle often is us trying to redefine who God is and not let the Scripture say who he is. All right? And we can wrestle with it, but the reality is we don't hear. We don't hear. Exodus 7:1–7. So that's my preface. All right, it says this: "And the LORD said to Moses." So he's still speaking. He's not removed, he's not quiet, he's not folding his arms, he's not inactive. He's what? Speaking. I love this particular word here, "the LORD said." This is not passive, but it's active, and it means that it isn't just he said then; it actually means he said then and he is still speaking today. So this is really important, the tense that it uses here. "And the LORD said to Moses, 'See, I have made you like God to Pharaoh, and your brother Aaron shall be your prophet.'"
Now, "I've made you like God to Pharaoh, and Aaron shall be your prophet." So who's going to speak? God's going to speak to Moses is going to speak to Aaron, and Aaron is going to speak to Pharaoh. And Aaron will be like you are to the nation. All right? You're like a prophet to the nation, but to pharaoh, Aaron is going to be like you are to the Israelite people. All right? Now, we know in the Old Testament it says that God spoke by his prophets at many times and in various ways, but today he speaks by his Son. And everything that he has said, he has said through his Son, which is the Word. We have it, thank goodness. Amen? And so we know what he has said. You want to know what God is saying to you?
Open this, because you can know. You can't guess; you can know. You don't have to use conjecture; you can know. And so I love this whole picture.
And then it goes on and it says, listen to this, "You shall speak." Everybody say "speak." Now let's go back: "And the LORD said to Moses, 'See.'" Everybody say "see." So he's telling Moses, "See." So what does he have to do? So he sees, opens his eyes, that he can see. All right? And now, so I want to say just beyond the command, this is more than a command. I believe this is a God actively opening up sight for Moses. Okay? You don't have to agree with this. I'm going to give my reason why I believe this; it's in Exodus 4. All right? But I'm going to give some key words. "See, I have made you like God to pharaoh, and your brother Aaron shall be your prophet. You shall speak." Everybody say "speak." "All that I command you, and your brother Aaron shall tell." Say "tell." "Pharaoh to let the people of Israel go out of his land. But I will harden Pharaoh's heart, and though I multiply my signs and wonders in the land of Egypt, pharaoh will not listen." Everybody say "listen." Notice here, there is hearing and not hearing, there is seeing and not seeing, there is speaking and not
Point 2God opens mouths, ears, and eyes as he wills
Speaking. Notice now, let's pause here before we read the rest of this section, and let's go to Exodus 4:11. Whenever Moses began to moan that he wasn't the best mouthpiece for God, what does God say to him? This is in remembrance, because we have gone through Exodus 4. Exodus 4:11 says, and you guys don't have this, I just did it last minute, Exodus 4:11 says, "Then the LORD said to Moses, 'Who has made man's mouth? Who makes him mute?'" Whoa. You mean God makes people mute? I thought it was sin that did that. That's not what it says, but that's what people will say in your small group, because there is nothing that is bad like that would come from God, right? So now you get to determine what's good and bad. And this is why the Bible reminds us, whenever we get into these conversations about what we think's good and bad, it reminds us, yo, only God is good.
So you best pay attention to what he says he does, because he gets to define it, not you and your small group. I don't know what you're saying in your small group. I don't even think we're talking about this. I'm just saying this is the general statement that I have heard within the last month regarding certain things that must be from the devil, that's bad. And I just get these little inklings from the Scripture, like, "Only God is good." Like, recall, it has to be the Holy Spirit, just recall of Scripture. And I go, wait a minute. And then he goes on, it says, "Who makes him mute or deaf, or seeing," oh, that's encouraging, he helps people see, he's a miracle-working God, "or blind?" Shoot, just pick one, man. Are you good? Are you bad? Are you good cop, bad cop? Which one are you? He's in control, and he's God. That's who he is. That's what he's trying to say. "Is it not I?" And in case, because there's some of these people in here today: "Well, that's Old Testament, Shawn." He makes people mute and deaf in the New Testament. He gets people to stop talking because they don't like what they're saying, and so they can learn their lesson, and then he opens their mouth back up again. That's in the New Testament. Just, everybody, just, all right. "Is it not I, the LORD?" Now, we can have questions all day long. Here's where questions lead: it's "Why does God do that?"
We get to know what God does. We don't necessarily get to know why he does it.
Pastor Shawn Gray · 15:45
The why is not for you; the why is for God. Amen? And at the end of the day, if you spend all of your time trying to figure out the why, you will work yourself up into a tizzy. And honestly, the devil loves that, because he gets you to wrestle with conjecture to the point that you no longer believe the truth. And the truth is the what. And if you won't embrace the what, but you're always wrestling with the why, you'll never get the truth, and you will live according to a lie, and you'll think you're serving God when you're actually serving the devil. At the end of the day, you can ask the question why, but at the end of the day, most of the time you'll never get the answer. That's the facts. What you can have the answer to is the what. But the problem is we don't even like the what; that's why we ask the why. Can I get an amen up in here? Yeah.
And I'm just telling you, when we get to a what we don't like, we start asking the why to dismantle the what.
Embrace the what whether you like it or not, because God is God, and he gets to determine what the what is, not you.
Pastor Shawn Gray · 16:51
And listen, the most prevalent way you can know whether you don't like a truth or not is when you ask why a lot. That lets you know in that moment. And we all should be able to be at a place, and this should be comforting, where you go, "-oh, I don't like a truth. Now what am I going to do about that?" Okay, I love this. So why did you read Exodus 4:11? It's God who makes the mouth, it's God who makes the mute, it's God who makes them deaf, it's God who makes people see, it's God who makes people blind. "Is it not I, the LORD?" Everybody say "LORD." This word "LORD"
Here is a word, oh, man, it means, I can't remember, the ratifier. Everybody know the word "ratify"? Look it up in the dictionary, right? So it means that God has determined and ratified through Christ that thing which God the Father has determined to bring glory to him. Okay? So God decides and God ratifies in advance. All right? That's really important. That's the root word of that. God has determined who will be mute, who will be deaf, who will be that. In the New Testament it says, "Who sinned, that this man should be born this way?" Remember how I say we have a tendency to blame it on sin and the devil, because God would never do that? And God said, "I made him that way to bring glory to me. No one sinned. This is not about sin. Stop trying to blame it on sin. I am the Lord God who determined to do this ahead of time." Are you with me today? You don't have to like it. I don't necessarily like it. I'm just saying that's the way it is.
Now, as we do this, what he is saying is, "I've determined how people will hear and whether they will hear." So then, when you go back to 7:1 through 3 here, we get to see a picture of, "See, Moses." See, you only see because I let you see. "I've made you like God to Pharaoh, and your brother Aaron shall be your prophet. You shall speak." He only speaks because God opened his mouth, and he's no longer mute and he can speak. And listen, God has not only determined that Moses will speak, but God has determined who he will speak to. See, the reality is some of us don't even consider who the Lord wants us to speak to. We're speaking to everybody we shouldn't be speaking to, and not who we should be speaking to. Some of us are flapping our jaws so much, we hadn't even considered the fact that God don't want us flapping our jaws to everyone. Some of us flap our jaws to everybody else but our children, and our children need to hear more from us than anybody, but we don't say nothing. We're mute to the kids in our house who we were supposed to raise up in the image of the Lord, training them to know who the Lord is and who Christ is. But we don't say anything to them, but we talk to our friends, and talk to our sisters, and talk to our brothers, and talk to everyone else, talk to the people at work. And when we get home, we don't have time to talk to our kids. But God has purposed you to not be mute to your kids, but be mute to everything else out in the world that you've been yapping your jaws to, and save your word quota for your kids. Are you with me today? But we don't consider our duty.
Listen, if you have a kid, you have a duty.
Pastor Shawn Gray · 20:53
Duty? "Well, I didn't bring this on myself." Who did? If you have a kid, you have a duty. Don't you wear yourself out with everything else and then not serve your duty to your kid. See, some of you are praying a prayer that God would position you to proclaim the gospel to your parents, that they would know Christ. But maybe the way God has intended for the gospel to come to your parents is through your kids, but you failed to proclaim the gospel to your kids around the dinner table. And so the gospel never gets to where it should go, because you won't proclaim it where you were supposed to proclaim it. We don't consider. We're muting in all the wrong places, and we speak in all the wrong places, because we do not understand. We want to determine when to speak and when not to speak. I just love this. And then he goes, "But I will harden Pharaoh's heart." Now listen to this. So God has purposed for him to speak as God to Aaron, and Aaron as a prophet to Pharaoh, but he's also intended for Pharaoh to not hear and be deaf. And the way that he's going to deafen his ears, where he doesn't hear, is by hardening his heart. Isn't it crazy that sometimes the command is, and the empowerment is, that you can't even stop yourself, that God has purposed you to speak to people who he's also purposed to never hear? And the command is not based on the success of your delivery. And sometimes God has purposed us for a season to preach to people who will never hear. Who wants that job? Why? That's what our kids ask. That's what we ask as kids to our father: "Why?" "Clean your room." "Why?" Then you give them an answer, and they're like... Not the kids in here.
"Why?" You know how annoying that must be to God? As parents, is that annoying? "Because I said." See, the problem is we think our words hold more power than God's word. Because God can say a thing, and we keep asking why, but our kids say a thing, we say, "Because I said so." And we think that comes with power, but when it comes to God, we think it has no power. I'm trying... You know why? You know why? You know why?
Because we think we're more sovereign than God. We think our words carry more weight than his.
Pastor Shawn Gray · 23:52
That's why we say, "Because I said so," because our words have power; his words are worthless. What if God said "Because I said so" to you? "But if you love me, you'd tell me." No, he wouldn't. Wouldn't you tell your kids "Because I said so"? I think that's a legitimate answer. It teaches your children that words and commands mean something. But it only is powerful if God's words and commands mean something. And that is evident when your kids look at you and how you deal with your Father, your heavenly Father. If your kids can look in the Bible, and they can clearly see... I didn't even get to my notes. If your kids look in the Bible, don't worry, I see the clock, if your kids look at the Bible and they see something that you refuse to do, you refuse to do it, you refuse to submit to it, you refuse to stop doing something he doesn't want you to do, and then you tell them to do something and they whine, and you say, "because I said so," they don't think... They're not going to be in the house, and go, "How does this work in your relationship with God? Because I kind of see a lot of stuff that he says that you don't do. So do I get a pass then, since this is..." Do you know? "Do what I say because I said
Point 3Dependence on God makes a praying church
So," but then you just never do what God says. It's a double standard. It's a double standard. Did you know you're teaching your kids? We need to pray. Because if God's involved in us hearing, and is speaking, and is speaking to the right people at the right time, and is seeing what we need to see at the right time, if God is ultimately responsible for this, we should be praying that God would open our ears, open our mouths, and give us the people to speak to, and give us the things to see. We need to be asking and beseeching God to reveal to us what we need to be his vessel. We need prayer.
You know why we don't have a praying church? It's because we have a church filled with gods.
Pastor Shawn Gray · 26:30
Yes, amen. We don't need him to open our eyes that we see. We don't need him to open our ears that we hear. We don't need him.
We don't need him. We're God. We're in control of our destiny, we're in control of our life, we're in control of our choices. We have a will that's greater than his will. Why do we need prayer? We'll just do as God. So we have churches empty of prayer, because there is no dependency on a God that's in control of it all. It's a problem. You could have conferences all day long teaching about how to pray to God, but it will teach people nothing until we understand that nothing happens without it being under his mighty purposes and sovereignty. That makes us turn to God. That makes us turn to God. Okay, verse 4: "Pharaoh will not listen to you. Then I will lay my hand on Egypt and bring my hosts, my people the children of Israel, out of the land of egypt by great acts of judgment." But you're like the Israelites, right? I mean, yeah, it's directed, it's directed to Egypt, that's the judgment, but don't think the Israelites come out unscathed. Let me just pause. This has nothing to do with my sermon, but let me just pause here for a second and say to you that if you think that somebody in your house that God is coming at with judgment because of their life, that won't affect the whole house, you're nuts.
There is no man that is an island, and when God's judgment falls, it falls in the vicinity.
Pastor Shawn Gray · 28:35
Now notice here, as we move through Exodus, everybody experienced the mess. It was rough. Oh, there were moments where he protected things, and there were moments where he did that, but everybody experienced the judgment. It was directed at one; it impacted them all. That's why you should be mindful, parents, what you do in your home. Be mindful. "Then I'll lay my hand on them, bring them out by great acts of judgment. The Egyptians shall know that I am the LORD, when I stretch out my hand against Egypt and bring out the people of Israel from among them. Moses and Aaron did so; they did just as the LORD commanded them. Now Moses was eighty years old, and Aaron eighty-three years old, when they spoke to pharaoh." I'll say this, and then I'm done with my introduction. And I see the clock. I see the clock, I see it, I'm good. This is a book of faith. I believe that if we were to consider what would happen if God showed up in Pharaoh's room, "Hey, what you doing?" And spoke to him, I'm pretty sure he would tremble and release, because that's the typical response. People fall down and they give up in his presence. It is interesting, then, that he sends a prophet. He said, "You'll be like God, and Aaron will be like a prophet." Why does he do that? I'll tell you why he uses prophets. This is the easiest summary that I can use. Some of you think he uses prophets for belief. Some of you think that he uses parables to make it easier for people to believe. Wrong on both accounts. He uses prophets and he uses parables that those who are supposed to believe will believe, and those who are not will not. He actually says in the Bible the parables are not used that people can understand God's truth more, because he would tell the parables, and those that were with him were like, "Huh?" And actually Jesus says, "I did this to hide the truth." That way only those who are supposed to know the truth will know the truth, and everybody else, they will be blinded to the truth, because it's hidden in a parable, like a treasure in a field. Are you with me? So in other words, a parable would be spoken, and those that God wanted to have faith, he would give them faith, that they would then respond accordingly because of that prophecy or because of that parable. In the same place, the same parable and the same prophecy would be spoken, and there would be people in there who would be hardened and turn away. They would be following Jesus, they would hear a parable or a prophecy, and they would turn away by droves, because this was a hard truth and they were hardened by it.
So some would get in by faith and some would be hardened by the hard truth. Same word, same delivery system, same person speaking. So it is God's way of, at the same time, getting the Israelites to have faith that this is how God will deliver, and it hardens another nation. "Well, if you just prophesied better..." Aaron must have been the breakdown; otherwise everybody would have got set free. "If we turn the music up, turn the volume up a certain amount, and we lower our tempo and we raise it up, and a certain thing gets people excited, and then we have lights move just at the right time and the right place, and we do all of that, then people will get saved."
None of that even really saves. God saves.
Pastor Shawn Gray · 33:26
"Well, how did they have faith?
Well, some had faith because they just had more faith." It says that God gifts faith, that no one can boast. How does he gift it? By the proclamation of the word. How do we get the word? God speaks to prophets, and prophets speak to men. How do we get the word now? God spoke by his Son, and it's documented here, and this is how we get faith. "So the Bible gives us faith?" No, that's the vessel by which God gives faith. It's through the hearing of the word. But everybody that hears does not get saved. "What do you mean, Shawn?" Seed falls on some different ground and it doesn't take root. Why? Because those people don't get saved. Same word, same delivery system, same throwing, same sowing person, same everything. Some get saved, some don't. Some get into the kingdom, some don't. God determines. Are you with me today? It's rough. It's facts. And so here we have this picture where God speaks and some hear, and God speaks and some don't hear. God speaks and some see, God speaks and some don't see. Let us be a praying church, that we pray that we see and we hear, and that our family sees and they hear, and that those we're in touch with see and hear, and that our children would see and hear. God, open their ears to hear.
Let us be like Paul, and let us beat the dead, rotting corpse of our children until they are taken down from their rotting state and go to see the king. That beating is not physical; it is prayer. Are you laboring in prayer over your children? Exodus 4:11 says, "Then the LORD said to him, 'Who has made man's mouth?'" We read this.
"Who makes him mute, or deaf, or seeing, or blind? Is it not I, the LORD?" Now, many people read this and either say God is not fair. I've said this. It's okay. Some of you are like, "Who do I look at? Who do I look at right now that I can send this to?" All of us have said this. Not just even some; all of us have said, "Well, that's not... God's not fair." And what we tend to do is create a theological position that makes God fair again, but it's not truthful. God's not fair. Or they come up with some alternative interpretation to validate their perspective of an unfair God. Can I just start by saying this? This will help you. This will set you free.
God's not fair, and you don't want him to be.
Pastor Shawn Gray · 36:12
Because the Bible says all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God, and are heading to hell, and should go there. Amen? That's what it says. We're damned, we're doomed, we're on the highway to hell. I mean, literally. And if he's fair, you're going there. It's because he's not fair that he sent his Son. So let's just get past this conversation of, "Well, is God fair? Well, yeah, he's fair, because he's always fair, because he's God, and God's good, and so because he's good, then he's fair." Wrong. "Well, no, but that's good." I'm not... "Don't make God bad." You don't get to make the rules. You don't get to make the rules. It's not fair. God's hardening of the sinner's heart is one of the most debated themes in the Bible. It's an incredible theme throughout Romans 9, I say 8, 9, and 10 and 11, that people hate to talk about, and we lost half our church on. It's very frustrating to people, and I understand it. I'm sympathetic. I'm sympathetic. It's debated. It's an incredible theme in Romans and Exodus, and no chapter of Scripture has inspired more questions than Exodus 7. But you didn't think that, did you? And Romans 9. There seem to be conflicting scriptures in these. Let me read them to you. Romans 1:24–27 says this: "Therefore God gave them up." Which came first, the chicken or the egg? Are you with me? You know that saying? It's an annoying saying, right? But we do this theologically with God. "Well, which came first? Did God harden Pharaoh's heart first, or did he harden his heart first, and then God had to respond and was forced to be the master of whatever his first decision was?" Which came first, the chicken or the egg? Somebody said the chicken, somebody said the egg. Hence is the problem. "Therefore God gave them up in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, to the dishonoring of their bodies among themselves, because they exchanged the truth about God for a lie and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever! Amen. For this reason God gave them up to dishonorable passions. For their women exchanged natural relations for those that are contrary to nature; and the men likewise gave up natural relations with women and were consumed with passion for one another, men committing shameless acts with men and receiving in themselves the due penalty for their error." You can figure out what that is. Paul seems to be saying here that God gave over these sinners to dishonorable passions as a consequence for their sins. That's what it seems to be saying. But then we come to Romans 9:10–18, where he says, and this seems to be contradictory, "And not only so, but also when Rebekah had conceived children by one man, our forefather Isaac, though they were not yet born..." Though they were not yet born. They weren't born yet. Did you know they weren't born? "...Though they were not yet born and had done nothing..." They had done nothing. Nothing had been done. "...Either good or bad, in order that God's purpose of election might continue, not because of works but because of him who calls, she was told, 'The older will serve the younger.' As it is written, 'Jacob I loved, but Esau I hated.'" Now let me just help you, because here comes another why question: why does God hate? This is referring to those who he has elected to go to heaven and those he has not. "What shall we say then? Is there injustice on God's part?" There's the why question. Is God unfair? We already answered that question. "By no means!" Is there injustice on God's part? "By no means! For he says to Moses, 'I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion.'" Meaning that it's not unjust, because "I get to decide, 'cause I'm God." That's what makes it not unjust. "So then it depends not on human will or exertion, but on God, who has mercy. For the Scripture says to Pharaoh," and you hear this, "For the Scripture says to Pharaoh," this is still in Romans 9:10–18, "for the Scripture says to Pharaoh, 'For this very purpose I have raised you up, that I might show my power in you, and that my name might be proclaimed in all the earth.' So then he has mercy on whomever he wills, and he hardens whomever he wills." Meaning he doesn't have mercy on those he hardens. Paul seems to indicate that God himself hardens sinners in unbelief. God hardens whomever he wills. So in the case of Romans 1, did God harden these sinners before he gave them up to dishonorable passions? Which came first? Did the sinners harden their own heart first, or did God harden their heart? Well, let's look at Pharaoh. Here's the order. Three times Yahweh declares that he will harden Pharaoh's heart. Three times. Here's the order: Exodus 4:21, Exodus 7:3, Exodus 14:4. Six times Yahweh actually hardens Pharaoh's heart: Exodus 9:12, Exodus 10:1, Exodus 10:20, Exodus 10:27, Exodus 11:10, Exodus 14:8. Seven times the hardening is expressed as a divine passive, with Yahweh as the implied subject. But the passive hardening only comes through the active hardening. Pharaoh's heart was hardened by Yahweh: Exodus 7:13, 7:14, 7:22, 8:19, 9:7, 9:35, and 14:5. And three times out of all those times, three times we're told that Pharaoh hardened his own heart: Exodus 8:15, Exodus 8:32, and Exodus 9:34. Before I get into this, let me just
Point 4There is no heart too hard for God
State this, and this is point number one, and I know I have two minutes left. Calm down, I got it.
There is no heart that is too hard for God.
Pastor Shawn Gray · 43:17
Somebody, everybody just go, "Oh, thank you, man. Thank you for chilling out on us for a second, man. Thank you for encouraging my heart today, brother." There is no heart too hard for God. That's good news. The first thing I want to say is that there is no hardness in the human heart against God, either from God's decree or from human depravity, which is too hard for God himself, where he cannot overcome it and save the hardest sinner. There are some people that you might be looking at and thinking about in your life, considering today, they're just too far gone.
No one's too far gone. If God wills it will be done.
Pastor Shawn Gray · 44:07
If God wills that hardened heart softened, he will soften it. Now, I start here because I know thousands of people who have friends and family who've been resisting the gospel for years. They've rejected it and rejected it and rejected it. And I know how easy it is to despair over family and friends, that they would never be saved, they're just too hard. And so our hearts tempt us to believe that lie. What I want to stress here at the outset of this is that it is the very omnipotence, the very sovereignty and the freedom of God, who says, "I will have mercy on whomever I will, and I will harden whomever I will." It is this freedom, which is more powerful than any freedom you think you have and more powerful than any power you think you wield, that is our only hope. You cannot hope in anything you will and you wield on your own. Our only hope is in him. "Shawn, why do you keep hammering on this?" Because I can't get away from Scripture that's hammering on this. Find me a book of the Bible that don't talk about this mess. But if he's talking about this mess so much, it must be more essential than what we have ever imagined. Maybe this is more of a "firstary" issue than a secondary issue. Yes, I made that word up. Primary, that's boring. I like "firster," and I got the mic. It's more of a bigger issue than we think. You know why I think that? It's the way that Satan gets into the heart of the church and steals our hope.
Because if you hope in you have no hope at all.
Pastor Shawn Gray · 46:21
And if you get this theological principle off, and you don't know where your hope comes from, and you don't hope in him because you get this theological principle off, you live your life void of hope, a miserable soul. It's a big deal. Let's move on. Everyone's cursed from birth. You're like, "I don't know about that." He said, "men, you now will work by the sweat of your brow." And can I get an amen? Doing backbreaking work. You ain't going to walk around and say something and it's just going to poof into being. You got to go toil and trouble. "And women, you got to have them kids, and if that ain't painful enough, i'm going to make it hurt. I'm going to make it hurt." And you did all of that because Adam and Eve sinned, and then that is transferred to you. We live as a part of a fallen world, and we're a fallen people, and everyone... I mean, see, be careful to not go, "Well, because Pharaoh was a hardened man, and because he didn't listen to God, and because he hardened his own heart, that's why God turned him over to himself and kept hardening it. So Pharaoh determined to harden his own heart, and then God just, you know, agreed." If that's the way God responds, then all y'all are hardened and going to hell, because every person on the earth is born into a hardened state. Are you with me? And it ain't my choice, baby. You're born in. Thanks, Adam and Eve. Now, you can sit around your dinner table and be like, "Punks. You believe what they did to us?"
And you can bicker about them all day long. But if you were in the garden and you were the first people, you might have done worse, but you definitely would have at least done the same. All right? That's the way it is. So if God acquiesces to our hardening, if he acquiesces to how we act, if he acquiesces to whether we sin or not, we're all in trouble.
What you want is you want a God who isn't dependent on what you do, because if he's dependent on what you do, we're all doomed.
Pastor Shawn Gray · 48:50
I want a God who shows mercy on who he pleases to show mercy, because if not, we're all doomed. That's good. Be very careful to not try to put this back into the hands of men, because you'll lose your hope real quick. Because here's the thing, because here's the thing: at one point we're trying to justify what we think God is doing, that's not fair. But we know our heart. At the same time, while we try to make God look good with this theological position, we at the same time know our heart, and we have no hope, because we know who we are. And we know that if we create this theological position where God's dependent on what I do, we know deep down in the recesses of our heart, what it desires is not good. And so we enter into despair. I'm trying to preach here. Listen to me today. And there are many people in the church who are in despair because they think they're in control.
God's in control, and your only hope comes from his mercy.
Pastor Shawn Gray · 50:02
All right? Not from your good deeds, 'cause you ain't good. No, not one. No, not one.
No, not one. What was their condition before this handing over in Romans 1, or you could say this hardening? What was the condition before that? Let's let Paul describe it. When we read Romans 1, we say that God turned them over. What is the position? Here's what Paul says in Ephesians 4:17–18: "now this I say and testify in the Lord, that you must no longer walk as the Gentiles do, in the futility of their minds. They are darkened in their understanding, alienated from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them, due to their hardness of heart." Hardness of heart. That's the key. And all of us are guilty. All of us have been hardened by sin, and all of us have sinned. But so what's our hope? What hope do we have? When God decides to show mercy, or whether God continues to harden it, the initial hardening came from God as punishment because of sin in the garden, and the continual hardening is dependent on God. He will either harden or he will soften. He will harden or he will soften. It depends on God. Paul traces the condition of the gentiles, and that's universally all of us, but he's going to say in a minute that the condition includes Jewish people as well, back through futile minds, through darkened understanding, through alienation from God, through ignorance, and finally at the bottom, the hardness of heart. That's the root problem. And Paul makes plain that this spiritual hardness is universal, for Jew and Gentile, not just Gentiles, because he says in Ephesians 2:1–3 this: "And you were dead in the trespasses and sins," you were dead, "in which you once walked, following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience, among whom we all once lived in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the body," sound like Romans 1, "and the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, like the rest of mankind." That's everyone. Jeremiah 17:9 says this, in case you think your heart's good, and that's why you get a pass, and that's why God doesn't harden you, and that's why he decides to show mercy to you, because he looked through the corridor of time and saw you were going to be a good apple on your own strength. Jeremiah 17:9 says, "The heart is deceitful above all things,
Point 5Design over nature: what God designs, he delivers
And desperately sick; who can understand it?" Last point. Last point: design over nature. I choose to believe in God's design over the nature of men.
What God designs, he delivers.
Pastor Shawn Gray · 53:37
They were by nature, because of sin, it says. The Bible says we "were by nature children of wrath, like the rest of mankind." This is the condition of every human being, that we are, when we're born into this world, by nature sons of disobedience. That is, by nature we disobey. It's our nature to disobey. By nature we rebel, by nature we are selfish, by nature we ignore God, by nature we're God-belittling, and therefore by nature we deserve God's wrath. Who will help us? Now, how did this come about, that all human beings by nature are justly subject to the wrath of God because of our proneness to disobey and rebel as sons of disobedience? Paul answers this in Romans 5: that Adam's sin infected everyone. That is, the punishment that fell to Adam fell on all of us who are a part of Adam as his descendants. Here's how Paul puts it: "Therefore, as one trespass led to condemnation for all men, so one act of righteousness leads to justification and life for all men. For as by the one man's disobedience the many were made sinners, so by the one man's obedience," Jesus Christ, "the many will be made righteous." Can I get an amen up in here?
There is no hope for you but through Jesus Christ our Lord.
Pastor Shawn Gray · 55:08
He is the only way to salvation, the only way. By nature, everyone in this room was a child of wrath. But what of God's design? What of God's purpose to show mercy on some? What Romans says: a remnant few will enter in. Wide is the gate to destruction, and narrow is the gate to heaven, but few will find this one, and many will find this one. Who will he show mercy to? Over in chapter 6: "Then the LORD said to Moses," and don't forget this, I'm going to remind us of this, in case you're wondering if this has to do with you. And we've just went through a painstaking process of helping you understand: if it's up to you, we're doomed. We all have a bad heart. We all have a hardened heart. We all by nature are children of wrath.
We're disobedient. We're not going a good direction. We won't choose good. We won't do good. We'll continue to spiral down into depravity, and that is how it is. That's where we're going, unless God shows mercy and intervenes. And in case you're doubting me, and like, "Where's that in Exodus?" Exodus 6 says this: "Then the LORD said to Moses," verse 1, "'Now you shall see what I will do to Pharaoh; for with a strong hand he will send them out.'" "He just chose to do it 'cause he's a bad dude. He's just stubborn, and because he's stubborn, then God punishes him." That's not what it says. He won't let them go because God compels him to not let them go. Where do we come up with our theological positions? They're not in the Bible. He will let them go, eventually, and under compulsion he will drive them out of his land. Under compulsion.
We don't have a problem with sovereignty; we have a problem with God being sovereign.
Pastor Shawn Gray · 57:23
Be careful who you assign supreme authority, supreme power, and supreme sovereignty to.
Glory follows the assignment of sovereignty in the hearts of those who assign it.
Pastor Shawn Gray · 57:36
Philippians 2:9–10: "Therefore God has highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name that is above every name, so that at the name of Jesus," eventually, "every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father." So right now your heart might assign sovereignty and power and mastership and authority to somebody else, but eventually every tongue will assign that authority to God, regardless of your theological position today, and acknowledge that he's God, Master, Sovereign, orchestrator of everything. The ratifier, in this sense, the word that's used, the root word that is used here specifically, is the ratifier of all things, determined in advance, to the glory of God the Father. That's what it says. That's what it means. I didn't make it up. God was the ultimate cause of all the hardening actions throughout Exodus 4, so that at no time was Pharaoh's volition independent of Yahweh's influence when he hardened his heart. Most people in church today are deists, we talked about earlier. Romans and Exodus give us little room to be a deist and much room to be a theist. And i'm closing with two short verses. I'm done. You've been very patient. Thank you. You've been very patient. Yes, I did go over. Don't look back. Don't you dare.
But I went over, and I'm really sorry. I'm really sorry. Romans 9:18: "So then he has mercy on whomever he wills." It doesn't say here he has mercy on the good people. He has mercy on those who he sees through the corridor of time who will choose him? His will is the indicator of mercy. Whomever he wills. There's nothing about looking through the corridor of time. "And he hardens whomever he wills." There's nothing about looking through the corridor of time, seeing that Pharaoh is going to be a stinker, and then deciding to just enforce him being the stinker that he decided he was going to be. It's not in the Bible. It doesn't exist. Now, you can ask why. You may never get that answer. I still don't know why. Because God is God, and because he wills it. That's why. That's the best why you're going to get, because he does it to whomever he wills. Ezekiel 36. Listen to this, in case you're wondering who does this. This is the best Scripture I could find. Listen to how much it says "I will," in case you're wondering if it's really his will or your will that does it. Let's listen to a prophet. Let's listen to a prophet and understand today that seed will fall on ground and some won't take root, in this Scripture I read from a prophet. Are you with me today? Because that's just the way it works. That's the way it worked with Pharaoh when he got a word from his prophet. That's the way it worked for the different nations. That's the way it works today in our midst. And as I read this, some will hear it, and some will take root, and some will not; they'll be plucked up. But this says nothing about our will in here. It's a fact. Listen: "Therefore say to the house of Israel, Thus says the Lord GOD: It is not for your sake," it is not for your will, "O house of Israel, for your sake that I am about to act, but for the sake..." Did you hear that? It ain't because of what Pharaoh did that I acted the way I did. It's not because I looked down and I saw Israel was so good. A very stinky nation; Israel was crazy too. "I'm about to act, and it ain't for the sake of Israel, because y'all are a bunch of stinkers that I had to kill off in the desert, because you're stinkers. It's because I chose you." It's not your will. "...That I am about to act, but for the sake of my holy name, which you have profaned..." Who has profaned it? The people you think are so good. "...Among the nations to which you came. And I will vindicate the holiness of my great name," in spite of you, because I choose to, for my glory, "which has been profaned among the nations, and which you have profaned among them. And the nations will know that I am the LORD, declares the Lord GOD, when through you I vindicate my holiness before their eyes." Through the very people that profaned him, he vindicates his holiness, because only God can do that. Verse 24: "I will take you." That's encouraging, because I got problems. I mean, I don't know about you, but I got problems. To know that God can vindicate his good name through somebody like me, that's encouraging. That's encouraging. "I will take you from the nations and gather you from all the countries and bring you into your own land. I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you shall be clean," not because you're good, not because you chose better, not because you did better, but because I chose you. He just decided to do it through you, because that's the most unlikely people. The people who profane me, I'm going to make pure. How's that happen? 'Cause God. That's how. "...And you shall be clean from all your uncleannesses, and from all your idols I will cleanse you. And I will give you a new heart," that's not hard, that's good news, "and a new spirit I will put within you. And I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. And I will put my Spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes." You don't choose to do it. You don't will to do it. He causes you to do it. He compels you to do it. Love compels you to do it. "...And be careful to obey my rules. You shall dwell in the land that I gave to your fathers, and you shall be my people, and I will be your God. And I will deliver you from all your uncleannesses. And I will summon the grain and make it abundant and lay no famine upon you." Which came first, the chicken or the egg? But no one stops to ask, would there be either of them without God? No one cares to know about the God who made them, and therein lies the problem. The why, and which comes first, and the why did that happen, robs us from seeing God at all. Why assign importance to the order or the preeminence of one over the other, and rob God of glory altogether?
When we refuse to know God as he has made himself known in Scripture, we don't give up on worship.
Pastor Shawn Gray · 1:05:20
We actually just worship something altogether different than what we read in here, and that's the worst kind of blasphemy you could do.
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