wrath and the plagues

Exodus 8: 14-16
14"For this time I will send all My plagues on you and your servants and your people, so that you may know that there is no one like Me in all the earth.
15"For if by now I had put forth My hand and struck you and your people with pestilence, you would then have been cut off from the earth.
16"But, indeed, for this reason I have allowed you to remain, in order to show you My power and in order to proclaim My name through all the earth.


When I hear people talk of the Old Testament God versus the New Testament God, often it is like they are talking about two different Gods. The Old Testament God is often shown as a “hell fire and brimstone” God. There is a reason that God acted as he has, and often we mistake his wrath as vengeance, or as wrath for the sake of wrath. We often miss the point behind it. So I find myself reading about the Plagues, and thought this was an opportunity to explain my thoughts at least in brief.

God allowed the Egyptians to remain so that they might witness his power, and recognize God as the supreme all powerful God. God allowed them to live so that he might be glorified. If you remember, this is really how the whole showdown with Pharaoh started. God, through Moses and Aaron, instructed Pharaoh to let the Israelites go out and worship Him. In short he was saying let my people come glorify me, and all will be right with the world. However Pharaoh's heart was hardened, so God sent the plagues.

Now the plagues are often used by people to show an example of the wrath of God. People use it to show how God was a spiteful, and vengeful God. I think that mind set falls well short of the mark. Pharaoh's heart was hardened, the text reads that God hardened his heart in some verses, in others it simply says his heart hardened, and in verse 34 of this chapter it reads that he sinned and again hardened his heart. There lies the root of the problem. Did God harden Pharaoh's heart, or did he simply allow it allow it? I believe the question here is moot, for in the end verse 34 sums it up, Pharaoh sinned again and hardened his heart. One thing gets overlooked often in this story......freewill. Does God not allow our hearts to become hardened? If you think about it, we can all come up with a time that our hearts have hardened against something or someone. It is our choice how we deal with that. Just as it was Pharaoh's choice how to handle his hardship. Since the beginning of time, God has never removed a persons free will from them. The text does not read that God made Pharaoh go against him, nor does it read that God commanded Pharaoh to refuse to listen. Pharaoh's heart was hardened, and time and time again Pharaoh chose to turn his back on the will of God.

I believe if anything this actually shows a compassionate God. As God himself said, he could have struck the Egyptians down. That would have been the easy thing to do. However God used the opportunity to to give everyone a choice. HE used it as a way to show his power as the one God. God wants to be glorified, he wants us to acknowledge him as our God.....THE God, really that is all he asks for. Do not mistake this for vanity. God does not need us, he is not dependant on us, there is nothing that we can do for God that He cannot do for Himself, but there is nothing that we can do without him. Yet He serves us, He protects us, and this shows him to be a loving God, for all he asks in return is for us to acknowledge him, for us to glorify him in our thoughts, in our actions, in our words, and in our hearts.

Now it always seems to be asked why the plagues, they were so sever, they brought so much misery, if God is a loving God then why all of the wrath? First, hardened hearts require hard signs. If the Lord had produced a sky full of rainbows this too would have shown God's greatness, but it would not do much to soften hearts, would some believe yes, but most, no. If he had sent flocks of doves with olive branches in their beaks, and had he commanded all pain in the world to cease, here again some would turn but most would not. People love their sin, they love their lives, Sadly it often takes threatening that life to make them look at things differently. Second, had God not used the opportunities like this to show his power, to show the love of his people through his wrath, then I believe that we would not have been as receptive to the Prince of Peace when he came in to the world (many to this day do not accept him). God does not make mistakes, he has had his plan in place well before he created us. We however tend to have hard hearts, and hard heads. We accept God through Love today, because we know fully of his strength and power. While it is my hope that we all can see the full measure of God's love for us, it is by overcoming the tests that harden our hearts that we can fully appreciate it, and glorify Him.

Peace,
Rev. Thetford