Latest / Reformed Thinking / Providence in the Exodus: Israel Hated, Pharaoh Hardened, God Exalted, Helpless Saved

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Providence in the Exodus: Israel Hated, Pharaoh Hardened, God Exalted, Helpless Saved · Reformed Thinking

• 0:00
  You know, usually when we think about building a house, we we
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  picture an architect drawing up plans, ordering materials, and
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  slowly putting together something beautiful from
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  scratch. Right, a very orderly process.
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  Yeah, but imagine an architect who builds this glorious,
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  indestructible mansion using the very wrecking balls that his
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  enemies are swinging to tear it down.
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  Like the demolition attempts actually becomes a specific
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  mechanism of construction. That is a wild image.
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  Right, Well, welcome to reform thinking.
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  Today we are taking a deep dive into some staggering source
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  material that argues the greatest hostility you face in
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  life isn't, you know, a glitch in the universe.
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  It is actually the very mechanism of your rescue.
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  It really. Flips the script.
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  It does, and to understand how we really have to go back to the
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  sands of ancient Egypt. But before we get into the
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  history, we need to set the table here.
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  Yeah, we definitely need to set up the theological guardrails
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  for this discussion. Our sources pull straight from
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  Chapter 5 of the Westminster Confession, and the basic
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  framework here is that God, as the Creator, directs and governs
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  all creatures and actions. OK, all of them.
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  All of them. But the crucial caveat is that
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  he does so without coercing innocent people to commit evil
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  acts. Nor does he author sin.
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  I mean, that's a massive point to make right out of the gate.
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  It is. His governance is absolute, yet
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  it never violates the accountability of the creature.
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  Let me just stop you there for a second, because those terms can
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  feel a bit heavy. When we say God governs all
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  actions but isn't the author of sin, what does that actually
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  look like in practice? Right, it's a good.
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  Question like why do we need that specific guardrail before
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  we start talking about Egypt? Well, think of it like this.
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  God never injects fresh evil into a pure heart.
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  He never forces a morally upright person to suddenly, you
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  know, do something wicked against their will.
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  Right, because if he did. If he did that, he would be the
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  author of sin, and he would be violating his own holy nature.
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  OK, that makes sense. So the guardrail ensures we
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  understand that when humans act wickedly, the wickedness comes
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  entirely from their own fallen desires.
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  Yet God is still sovereignly managing and directing those
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  sinful desires to accomplish His righteous goals.
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  OK, yeah. So taking that framework, I want
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  you, the listener, to consider a highly, really counterintuitive
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  idea. What if the hostility you are
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  facing at work or in your community, your family, isn't
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  God just turning a blind eye? Yeah, what if it's intentional?
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  Exactly what if that hostility is the very tool he is using to
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  secure your deliverance? We see this happen on a massive
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  national scale in the Book of Exodus.
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  So let's look at the late 15th century BC.
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  What was actually happening to the Israelites?
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  We are looking at the 18th dynasty of the new Kingdom of
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  Egypt this was an era of unmatched military might and
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  architectural triumph the. Golden age?
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  Really. Absolutely.
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  Now, decades prior, you had Joseph, an Israelite, elevated
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  to the position of Hizir. His administration preserved
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  both Egypt and his own family from a catastrophic famine and.
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  Because of that, the Israelites were given the best landing
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  Goshen. Right, they were.
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  But Fast forward and the biblical text tells us a new
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  king arose who did not know Joseph.
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  Meanwhile, the Israelites were multiplying at just an
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  astonishing rate. I mean, this was the literal
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  fulfillment of the promise God made in Genesis to make
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  Abraham's descendants a great nation.
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  But the pharaoh of this era and historians usually point to
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  like, must the third or I'm going to tip the second.
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  He doesn't see a blessing. He looks at this demographic
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  explosion and sees a massive national security threat.
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  Precisely. Pharaoh operates as a paranoid,
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  calculating political tyrant. He is looking at this huge
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  immigrant population residing within his borders and he fears
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  they might ally with foreign invaders in the event of a war.
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  So it's a purely political calculation in his mind.
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  Yeah, and his solution is brutal.
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  It's systematic. First, he institute state
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  sponsored slavery. He forces the Israelites into
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  rigorous labor in mortar and brick, you know, building
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  supplies, cities like Pitham and Ramses.
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  Which is horrific enough on its own.
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  It is, but when that fails to curb their population growth, he
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  resorts to state mandated infanticide.
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  He actually orders the midwives to murder every newborn Hebrew
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  boy. Man, from a purely historical
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  booth on the ground perspective, it looks like the promises made
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  to Abraham were just buried in the mud of those brick making
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  camps. It looks completely hopeless.
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  Yeah, if you are an Israelite living through that, it feels
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  like God has completely lost control of the narrative.
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  But the sources point is to Psalm 105 verses 24 and 25, and
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  this text provides A theological reversal that just shatters how
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  we normally think about cause and effect.
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  It really pulls back the curtain on who is really driving this
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  oppression. Yes.
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  So Psalm one O 5 is this historical Psalm of remembrance
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  detailing God's faithfulness to Israel.
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  And verse 25 explicitly states that God turned their hearts to
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  hate His people to deal craftily with His servants.
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  The Hebrew word used there for turned is ha hack.
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  It means a complete overturning, like a radical reversal of a
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  situation. So.
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  It wasn't just passive. No, not at all.
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  The text insists that God did not simply sit in heaven and
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  watch the Egyptian slowly develop an organic hatred for
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  the Israelites. He actively overturned their
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  disposition from favorite to hostility.
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  Wait. Pause there.
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  How does God turn their hearts to hate without violating that
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  guardrail we just talked about? Like how does he do this without
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  being the author of their sin? Because the Egyptians were
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  already fallen, idolatrous people.
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  They were not innocent bystanders.
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  Prior to this, God had been extending restraining grace.
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  Meaning what exactly? Meaning He was essentially
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  holding back their natural depravity so that Israel could
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  flourish in Goshen. When the time came for Israel to
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  leave Egypt, God simply withdrew that restraining hand.
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  Oh wow. He let their latent wickedness
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  loose, and He sovereignly focused that animosity
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  specifically onto Israel. So he just aims the hatred
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  that's already there. Spot on.
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  This target in Hatred set the necessary stage for an eventual
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  miraculous deliverance. The Egyptians chose to hate, but
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  God orchestrated the timing and the target.
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  That is fascinating. One of the essays uses an
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  incredible analogy to explain this, comparing God's Providence
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  to a grandmaster in a chess match.
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  I love this analogy, it's so good.
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  Have you ever watched a grandmaster play chess against
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  an amateur? The amateur thinks they are
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  launching this brilliant attack. They are moving their Knights
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  and bishops aggressively, taking the center of the board.
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  And they think they're totally winning.
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  Right. And the Grandmaster just sits
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  there, calmly responding. But the Grandmaster isn't just
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  reacting. He doesn't reach across the
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  table and physically grab the opponent's hand to force a move.
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  He doesn't break the rules of the game.
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  Right, he doesn't coerce the amateur.
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  Exactly. Instead, he perfectly maneuvers
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  the amateurs aggressive hostile strikes.
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  He uses the opponent's own hostile strategy to trap them in
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  an inescapable checkmate. So Egypt, with all its imperial
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  arrogance, was essentially just a pawn on the chess board of
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  redemption. That is a brilliant way to
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  conceptualize it. God governs the sinful heart by
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  directing the creatures innate depravity toward his ordained
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  ends. The opponent thinks they are
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  winning right up until the final move, and logically this moves
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  us from the general hatred of the Egyptian masses to the
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  specific stubborn resistance of their supreme leader.
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  We see the anatomy of a hardened heart most vividly.
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  And Pharaoh. We really do.
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  So let's look at the decree of hardening.
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  What is so shocking here is the timeline.
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  Because before Moses ever steps foot in Pharaoh's court, before
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  he speaks a single word of warning about plagues or letting
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  the people go, God declares his intentions.
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  The timing is critical here. It is in Exodus 4.21 God tells
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  Moses I will harden his heart so that he will not let the people
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  go. God is guaranteeing Pharaoh's
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  rebellion before the 1st conversation even happens.
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  And the lexical precision in the original Hebrew is incredibly
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  helpful here for understanding how this actually works.
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  Moses employs 3 distinct Hebrew roots to describe this hardening
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  process throughout the narrative.
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  OK, what's the first one? 1st is Kazak, which means to
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  strengthen or make obstinate God fortified Pharaoh's resolve to
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  do what Pharaoh already desired to do, which was rebel.
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  So he's not forcing him to rebel, he's making him strong
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  enough to keep rebelling. Right.
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  Imagine a boxer who wants to keep fighting but is getting
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  exhausted. God gave Pharaoh the unyielding
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  stamina to withstand terrifying plagues so that he wouldn't just
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  cave in out of sheer physical fright before the divine plan
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  was complete. Oh man, so God is giving him the
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  endurance to sustain his own rebellion.
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  What are the other words? The second word is kabad,
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  meaning to make heavy or dull. This reflects the insensitive
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  nature of a reprobate conscience.
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  OK, So what does that look like in real life?
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  If my heart is being made heavy, what is happening to my brain?
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  Think about building calluses on your hands from lifting weights.
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  The first time you grip the iron, it hurts.
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  It causes blisters. But the 10th time or the 100th
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  time, the skin has thickened. You don't feel the abrasive iron
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  anymore. Or think about watching a
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  terrifying horror movie. The 1st jump scare makes your
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  heart race. By the 20th movie, you are
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  completely numb to the violence. Yeah, you just don't even blink.
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  That is the essence of the word Kabod.
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  Pharaoh became increasingly desensitized to the destruction
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  of his own nation. Terrifying.
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  And the third word. The third word is kasha, which
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  means to make stubborn. These are active verbs.
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  This is an active sovereign administration over the
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  rebellious mind. See, this challenge is a very
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  popular modern view, the idea that God is just up in heaven,
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  nervously reacting to human choices as they happen.
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  The sources call out theological systems like open theism or
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  Arminianism. Yeah, they take those head on
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  and. We want to fairly report what
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  the sources are arguing here. To put it plainly, those views
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  argue that human free will is the supreme deciding factor in
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  history. They suggest God looks down the
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  corridor of time, sees what humans will do, and then shapes
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  his plans around our choices. But the Apostle Paul picks up
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  this exact thread in Romans Chapter 9 and completely shuts
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  that down. He does.
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  Paul's argument in Romans 9 is a systematic defense of sovereign
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  grace. He looks back at the Exodus
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  narrative and uses the Greek word sclerinae, meaning making,
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  stiff or intractable. OK, sclerinae.
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  Yeah, and Paul places God's unmerited mercy and his act of
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  hardening on the exact same syntactic level the text states.
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  So then he has mercy on whomever he wills, and he hardens
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  whomever he wills. So they are totally parallel.
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  Exactly. If mercy is unconditional,
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  originating entirely in the sovereign will of the Creator
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  rather than human merit, then Paul argues that hardening is
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  equally unconditional. Now I have to stop you there
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  because this is where everyone pushes back.
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  If someone is listening right now, they are probably thinking
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  if God is the one fortifying Pharaoh's stubbornness, how is
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  Pharaoh still held accountable for his actions?
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  I mean, are we just looking at a cosmic puppet show here?
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  That's the immediate reaction, Yeah.
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  How? Can someone be a pawn on a chess
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  board totally maneuvered by the grandmaster, but also be
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  completely responsible for the moves they make?
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  How does that actually? Work.
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  That is the most common objection for sure, and the
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  theological answer is found in the concept of concurrence.
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  Let's break that down. A puppet has no desires.
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  A puppet has no mind, no will, no hatred.
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  It only moves because a string is pulled.
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  Right, it's just wooden string. Concurrence means God and man
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  are working simultaneously, but on different levels.
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  Pharaoh was acting freely according to his own rebellious
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  desires. He hated Yahweh, he loved his
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  own authority. He wanted cheap forced labor.
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  He wasn't a victim in this. Not at all.
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  God did not have to inject fresh evil into Pharaoh.
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  The hardening was a judicial act.
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  God judicially confirmed Pharaoh in the rebellion that Pharaoh
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  already loved and pursued. Wow.
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  Human responsibility and divine sovereignty function together
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  without canceling each other out.
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  Pharaoh is condemned for real willful defiance, while God's
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  purpose remains completely decisive over the outcome.
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  But this raises a massive question.
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  If God is actively orchestrating this resistance, why drag it out
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  for so long? You mean the plagues?
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  Yeah, why subject the land to 10 consecutive plagues?
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  God could have orchestrated a day one rescue.
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  He could have softened Pharaoh's heart immediately and had the
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  Israelites March out peacefully. Why the prolonged suffering?
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  Well, the biblical answer to that question crushes our human
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  pragmatism. We always want the fastest, most
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  efficient route out of pain, but God explains His motive in
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  Romans 9.17, quoting the book of Exodus.
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  What does he say? He tells Pharaoh that he was
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  raised up specifically so God could display his wrath and
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  supreme might. The 10 plagues were not random
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  natural disasters pulled out of a hat.
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  They were a calculated, systematic takedown of the
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  Egyptian pantheon. I want to look at that because
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  the plagues are often taught like it's a random sequence of
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  God weather, frogs, locusts, hail.
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  But they were targeted strikes, right?
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  Absolutely targeted. The Egyptians worship the Nile
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  River. They viewed it as the
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  bloodstream of the God Osiris, and they worshipped Happy the
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  spirit of the Nile. So what does God do?
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  He turns the Nile to blood, rendering their source of life
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  putrid. They worshipped a frog goddess
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  named Hecat, the goddess of fertility.
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  God multiplies the frog so drastically that they become a
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  rotting, putrid curse upon the land.
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  Just completely mocking their gods.
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  Yeah, they worshipped the sun God Ross.
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  God blots out the sun with thick darkness that could be felt.
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  Furthermore, Pharaoh himself was viewed not just as a king, but
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  as Horus Incarnate, a living deity.
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  So Pharaoh thought he was a God. Too.
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  Yes. And God raised Pharaoh up to
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  this pinnacle of earthly authority specifically to
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  humiliate that claim. God is systematically proving
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  that the local deities are absolute fictions and publicly
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  displaying absolute supremacy over the greatest empire on
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  earth. And this lengthy public display
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  secured the deliverance of the helpless by making the situation
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  completely impossible to solve through human means.
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  There was no. Way out.
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  There was no political treaty to be signed.
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  There was no armed Israelite rebellion taking down the
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  guards. Salvation had to come through
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  the blood of the Passover lamb and the miraculous splitting of
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  the Red Sea. The text prove that redemption
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  is an act of divine rescue bestowed upon the powerless,
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  not, you know, a cooperative effort between God and man.
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  God made Egypt an intolerable place for Israel by inciting
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  that initial hatred, ensuring they would long for deliverance
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  rather than assimilate into the Pagan culture.
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  Then, by hardening Pharaoh, God ensured the rescue would require
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  an undeniable, history altering miracle.
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  One of the essays uses a striking image for this
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  Pharaoh's hardened, stubborn rebellion acts as the dark
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  velvet backdrop upon which the brilliant diamond of God's
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  justice and grace is displayed to the watching nations.
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  Oh. That's a great visual.
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  Yeah, because when you walk into a jewelry store, they don't show
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  you a diamond on a white sheet of paper.
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  They put it on black velvet. You need that dark background to
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  see the brilliance of the jewel. Without the dark background of
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  Pharaoh's obstinate rebellion, the watching nations and
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  subsequent generations of Israelites would never have seen
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  the full spectrum of God's holy attributes displayed.
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  We wouldn't have seen His wrath, His justice, or his unmatched
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  might to save. So if God does this with a
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  political tyrant in ancient Egypt, what about the greatest
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  injustice in human history? How does this play out of the
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  cross? The Exodus is the supreme Old
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  Testament type of redemption, and it points directly to the
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  Lord Jesus Christ. But the most striking connection
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  lies in this doctrine of Providence over human hatred.
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  How so? Just as God ordained the hatred
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  of Egypt to bring about the deliverance from slavery, he
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  meticulously predestined the hatred of the Pharisees, the
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  cowardice of Pilate, and the brutality of the Romans to bring
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  about the salvation of the world.
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  We see this explicitly in Acts. Right, yes, Acts chapter 4,
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  verses 27 and 28. The early Church is praying and
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  they say that Herod and Pontius Pilate, along with the Gentiles
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  and the peoples of Israel, were gathered together to do whatever
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  your hand and your plan had predestined to take place.
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  I have to be honest, reading the sources here made me a bit
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  uncomfortable. They pushed back hard on a very
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  popular idea. Today we hear so much about
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  Jesus being a victim of a corrupt political system or a
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  martyr who got crushed by systemic injustice.
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  It's a very common narrative right now.
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  It is, and to report impartially on what the sources are doing
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  here. These essays forcefully reject
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  that. They argue against viewing
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  Christ as a tragic victim of a broken society.
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  Instead, they argue that Jesus was this sovereignly appointed.
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  Yeah, God turned the hearts of men to hate his own Son, pouring
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  out unmitigated wrath upon Christ so that helpless sinners
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  might be saved. The cross was not God's backup
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  plan after the religious leaders rejected Jesus.
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  If Jesus is just a victim of a broken political system, then
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  the crucifixion is an accident, a tragedy.
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  Righteous bad luck. But the biblical reality is that
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  the most heinous act of hatred in the history of the cosmos was
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  predestined by the hand and plan of God before the foundation of
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  the world. God utilized the wicked, willing
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  choices of men to accomplish the greatest act of grace
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  imaginable. So what does this mean for you,
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  the listener, in your daily reality?
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  The practical comfort here is massive.
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  When you face hostility, whether that is at work, in your
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  community, or in society at large, you can know with
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  certainty that your enemies are on a divine leash.
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  A divine leash I like. That yeah, God rules over the
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  rise and fall of animosity against his people.
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  This doctrine also completely slaughters the modern idol of
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  self esteem. We have to realize that by
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  nature we are carved from the exact same fallen clay as
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  Pharaoh. That's a hard pill to swallow.
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  It is, but if we are saved, it is exclusively because God
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  decided to have mercy, not because we were smarter or more
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  moral than anyone else. This theology provides an iron
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  pillar for the suffering St. When believers face roadblocks
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  or persecution, the natural human reaction is fear or doubt.
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  We assume God has lost control. We panic.
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  We do, but understanding that God governs even the hostility
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  of opponents completely shifts our perspective.
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  Our sources also issue a really sharp warning to the modern
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  church here. They push back against
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  pragmatic, seeker sensitive models.
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  You know, the smoke machines, the concert lighting, the Ted
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  talk style sermons that try to smooth out the rough edges of
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  God. The stuff designed to make it
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  more palatable. Exactly.
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  The text argues for the unvarnated proclamation of
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  truth, recognizing that marketing strategies cannot
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  raise the dead. Because those methods assume
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  that human marketing can change a hardened heart.
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  If we believe that men are naturally carved from the same
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  fallen clay as Pharaoh, then no amount of mood lighting or
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  clever storytelling can wake them up.
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  It just doesn't work that way. It requires A sovereign divine
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  act. We need a theology of suffering
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  and sovereignty, not just better branding.
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  Let me push back on behalf of the listener one last time.
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  It was a very urgent question. If someone is hearing this and
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  thinking, well, if God hardens whom he wills and my nature is
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  like Pharaohs, then I can't be blamed for my sin.
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  I'm just doing what I was programmed to do.
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  The fatalism argument. Right.
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  How does the biblical text answer that kind of fatalism?
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  The apostle Paul anticipated that exact objection in Romans
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  9, answering Who are you, O man, to answer back to God.
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  But even more practically, the author of Hebrews provides a
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  terrifying warning directly addressing this attitude.
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  What does Hebrew say? Hebrews 3.8 says today if you
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  hear his voice, do not harden your hearts.
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  The biblical warning is this. If you continually willfully
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  resist the gospel, God may eventually grant you the very
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  thing you desire. He gives you over to it.
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  He might stop pursuing you and leave you to the consequences of
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  your own autonomy. Repeated refusal leads to a
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  terrifying judicial blindness. You cannot use divine
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  sovereignty as a get out of jail free card for your own willing
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  rebellion. The call is always to repent and
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  flee to Christ while it is still called today.
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  To wrap up our deep dive today, the central take away from these
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  staggering essays is that the God of the Bible is not a
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  passive spectator. He isn't wringing his hands in
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  heaven, nervously watching history unfold.
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  Not all. He's the active orchestrator of
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  all things, ruling over the hatred of enemies, the hardening
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  of rebels, the exaltation of his own name, and the salvation of
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  the helpless. He makes the wrath of man to
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  praise Him. Every trial, every hostile act,
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  and every moment of suffering is meticulously governed by a
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  fatherly hand to secure the final redemption of His people.
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  So let this doctrine put steel in your backbone today, knowing
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  that the darkest circumstances are handled by a fatherly hand.
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  It changes how you face opposition.
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  Which brings us back to our opening thought.
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  The architect. Yes, think about that architect
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  using the enemy's Wrecking Ball to build his masterpiece.
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  If the Creator of the universe meticulously orchestrated the
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  rise and fall of the greatest ancient empire just to display
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  his glory and redeem a group of helpless slaves, how might he be
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  actively using the seemingly mundane, frustrating roadblocks
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  or opposition's in your own life right now to secure a victory
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  you cannot yet see?