WHY EGYPT?
HELD CAPTIVE IN EGYPT
1. Prophesied about
a. Genesis 15:13-14 “God said to Abram, ‘know for certain that your descendants will be strangers in a land that is not theirs, where they will be enslaved and oppressed four hundred years. But I will also judge the nation whom they will serve, and afterward they will come out with many possessions.’”
b. Their captivity does not show the weakness of God or His inability to protect His people. Rather it shows that He permitted it to happen because He was able to deliver His people.
2. Not for punishment due to bad behavior
a. Israel was often disciplined by God in this way but at this point in their history it wasn’t warranted, neither is it told to them that they were being disciplined for bad behavior.
3. Earliest case of abortion (Exo. 1:15-22)
a. The Hebrew midwives were God-fearing and pro-life (v. 17)
b. God blessed them for it (v. 21)
4. Intense labor and dreaded conditions (Exo. 1:11-14)
a. Couldn’t make sacrifices or worship
b. How many died from it?
c. How many were killed because they were worthless?
d. How many women were abused?
5. Four hundred years of slavery! Why?
SO GOD COULD SHOW HIMSELF TO BE MIGHTY
1. Ten plagues (Exo. 3:18-19) show God’s power over their gods
a. Aaron’s rod turns into a serpent (7:8-13)
b. The Nile turned into blood (7:14-25)
c. Territory covered with frogs (8:1-15)
d. All land covered with gnats/lice (8:16-19), swarms of flies (8:20-32)
e. Pestilence on the livestock (9:1-7) -
f. Boils breaking out on man and beast (9:8-17)
g. Heavy hail (9:18-35)
h. Locusts covered the land (10:1-20)
i. Darkness over the land (10:21-29)
j. Firstborn killed throughout the land (11:1-10)
2. That all may know that “I am the Lord”
a. Exodus 7:5 “The Egyptians shall know that I am the Lord, when I stretch out My hand”
b. Exodus 7:17 “By this you shall know that I am the Lord: behold, I will strike the water”
c. Exodus 8:10 “that you may know that there is no one like the Lord our God”
d. Exodus 8:22 “that you may know that I, the Lord, am in the midst of the land”
e. Exodus 9:29 “that you may know that the earth is the Lord’s”
f. Exodus 10:2 “that you may know that I am the Lord”
g. Exodus 14:4 “the Egyptians will know that I am the Lord”
SO ISRAEL WOULD BE DEPENDANT UPON HIM
1. Fervent prayers were made and God heard their cry
a. “Now it came about in the course of those many days that the king of Egypt died. And the sons of Israel sighed because of the bondage, and they cried out; and their cry for help because of their bondage rose up to God. So God heard their groaning; and God remembered His covenant with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. God saw the sons of Israel, and God took notice of them.” (Exodus 2:23-25)
b. “Go and gather the elders of Israel together and say to them, ‘The Lord, the God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, has appeared to me, saying, “I am indeed concerned about you and what has been done to you in Egypt.”’” (Exodus 3:16)
2. God has fixed salvation in such a way that we will always be dependant on Him for it. Whenever, men start to trust in themselves, God will humble them to the point where they must depend on Him.
a. Warning concerning the Temple. “If I shut up the heavens so that there is no rain, or if I command the locust to devour the land, or if I send pestilence among My people, and My people who are called by My name humble themselves and pray and seek My face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, will forgive their sin and will heal their land.” (2 Chronicles 7:13-14)
b. The case of Amon. “Amon was twenty-two years old when he became king, and he reigned two years in Jerusalem. He did evil in the sight of the LORD as Manasseh his father had done, and Amon sacrificed to all the carved images which his father Manasseh had made, and he served them. Moreover, he did not humble himself before the LORD as his father Manasseh had done, but Amon multiplied guilt. Finally his servants conspired against him and put him to death in his own house.”(2 Chronicles 33:21-24)
c. The Destruction of Jerusalem. “Zedekiah was twenty-one years old when he became king, and he reigned eleven years in Jerusalem. He did evil in the sight of the LORD his God; he did not humble himself before Jeremiah the prophet who spoke for the LORD. He also rebelled against King Nebuchadnezzar who had made him swear allegiance by God. But he stiffened his neck and hardened his heart against turning to the LORD God of Israel. Furthermore, all the officials of the priests and the people were very unfaithful following all the abominations of the nations; and they defiled the house of the LORD which He had sanctified in Jerusalem. The LORD, the God of their fathers, sent word to them again and again by His messengers, because He had compassion on His people and on His dwelling place; but they continually mocked the messengers of God, despised His words and scoffed at His prophets, until the wrath of the LORD arose against His people, until there was no remedy. Therefore He brought up against them the king of the Chaldeans who slew their young men with the sword in the house of their sanctuary, and had no compassion on young man or virgin, old man or infirm; He gave them all into his hand. All the articles of the house of God, great and small, and the treasures of the house of the LORD, and the treasures of the king and of his officers, he brought them all to Babylon. Then they burned the house of God and broke down the wall of Jerusalem, and burned all its fortified buildings with fire and destroyed all its valuable articles. Those who had escaped from the sword he carried away to Babylon; and they were servants to him and to his sons until the rule of the kingdom of Persia, to fulfill the word of the LORD by the mouth of Jeremiah, until the land had enjoyed its sabbaths. All the days of its desolation it kept sabbath until seventy years were complete.” (2 Chronicles 36:11-21)
3. “Pride goes before destruction, and a haughty spirit before stumbling” (Proverbs 16:8) for “God is opposed the proud but gives grace to the humble” (James 4:6), “therefore let him who thinks he stands, take heed that he does not fall” (1 Corinthians 10:12).
SO GOD COULD REDEEM THEM
1. So they would come out “with many possessions” (Gen. 15:14; Exo. 3:21-22)
2. To have a people for His own possession (Exo. 6:7)
a. Redemption is (1) God purchasing us (2) at a given price or ransom. When we are redeemed by God we are (3) owned by Him and (4) released from our previous owner.
b. In the case of Egypt, God purchased Israel by miracles and took them out of the land of Egypt to be their God and them His people and He released them from the ownership and bondage of Egypt.
3. To show His love and compassion on them
WHY DO WE HAVE TO DEAL WITH HARDSHIP?
1. So God can show Himself mighty
2. So we would depend on Him
3. So God can deliver and redeem us
a. Today God redeems men from sin, the curse of the law, the fear of death and the dominion of Satan and brings them into His fold and kingdom. He purchases them not with silver or gold but with the precious blood of Jesus. He now owns us (we are not our own), uses us and blesses us to the end they we may receive the inheritance.
b. “If you address as Father the One who impartially judges according to each one's work, conduct yourselves in fear during the time of your stay on earth; knowing that you were not redeemed with perishable things like silver or gold from your futile way of life inherited from your forefathers, but with precious blood, as of a lamb unblemished and spotless, the blood of Christ.” (1 Peter 1:17-19)
c. You may have hardship but in the end God will deliver you as His own possession!