Amen. So I've titled this message, Who is the Lord? And that question I pull from Exodus itself. We're gonna be in Exodus chapter nine today, but back in Exodus chapter five, when Moses first approaches Pharaoh and tells him God's command that he should let the people of Israel go, Pharaoh responds with a very important, serious question. Who is the Lord that I should obey his voice? You can hear the arrogance and pride in that question. Pharaoh setting himself above the Lord. But Pharaoh's question really isn't just Pharaoh's question. It's a question for all of us. And it really echoes the question of humanity since creation. Each one of us have to deal with this question for ourselves. Who is the Lord to us? We live in a day and age and a culture where we set ourselves on the pedestal, where we make truth whatever we want it to be, and we decide what's true for ourselves. So how does God answer this question? Well, he doesn't answer with just a word or explanation of who he is. He answers through actions and through the plagues. And God's answer through the plagues is both terrifying and glorious. His answers and his actions reveal his power, his justice, but also his mercy. So this passage we're reading in Exodus 9 is not just history, but it speaks to the core of who God is and how he works in the world. And it's a story that points forward to the cross, the ultimate picture, the ultimate display of justice and mercy. And it's a story that should demand a response from each one of us. When we read, when we listen, we should be asking ourselves, who is the Lord to you, to me? So, like I said, we're focusing on Exodus 9 here, which I was given plagues 2 through 9 to preach on. And the reason why I chose the seventh plague, the plague of hail in Exodus 9, is because in this plague specifically, we get more details into who God is, his motivations, the why behind the plagues. So this plague in particular really brings out themes that are reflected throughout all the plagues, all the retellings of the plagues. And the seventh plague specifically really unfolds like scenes from a movie. There's three different acts. There's God's declaration to Pharaoh, and then we see the account of the plague itself, and then the third act, Pharaoh's response. So that's how we're gonna be looking at the passage. So we'll begin with act one. God's declaration to Pharaoh. To bring this out, I wanna reread Exodus chapter nine, 13 through 16. So if you have your Bible out, or if you need one, there should be one in the chair that's in front of you, so go ahead and pull that out, open up to Exodus nine, and we're gonna read verses 13 through 16. So it says, then the Lord said to Moses, rise up early in the morning and present yourself before Pharaoh and say to him, thus says the Lord, the God of Hebrews. the Hebrews, let my people go that they may serve me. For this time I will send all my plagues on you yourself and on your servants and your people. And this is why I'm rereading this because this is where we see the purposes of God. So that you may know that there is none like me in all the earth. For by now I could have put out my hand and struck you and your people with pestilence and you had been cut off from the earth. And here's another purpose statement. But for this purpose, I have raised you up to show you my power so that my name may be proclaimed in all the earth. So I highlight this passage specifically because we see God is revealing himself through the plagues. And we see that in verse 14, where he says, you may know that there is none like me in all the earth. And in verse 16, that my name might be proclaimed in all the earth. So God is revealing himself through the plagues. We see here that he could have wiped Egypt off the map, just one breath from God and poof, Pharaoh, his armies, all his monuments could have been gone completely. So why does God spare them through all these plagues? And it's because his purpose is not just judgment, it's revelation. From the very first verse in Genesis, the story of the Bible is really a story revealing who God is. The more we read, the more we learn about his character, his purposes, and his glory. And all the way back in Genesis chapter 12, verse three, which is the Abrahamic covenant, we see God calling a man, Abraham, to himself. And he tells him that in you, all the families of the earth will be blessed. So God's goal was to make himself known to all the nations, not just one person, not just one people group, Israel, but all the nations of the earth. So we keep reading in Genesis, and then by the time we get to Exodus, God has his people, but they're enslaved, they're captive to Egypt. And we see the biggest threat to God's authority yet, Pharaoh, the king of Egypt. But not just any king, he's actually seen as a divine God. People see him as a God. So, what is God doing? That's the question, right? If you're an Israelite, you're enslaved in Egypt, and God has told you he's going to bless the nations, they're remembering this promise, they might have started asking themselves, is God really all powerful? Does God really see all that's happening to us? Does God still care? Do his promises still stand? Does he still love us? Maybe as I say those questions, you think to yourself, those are some of the questions I've asked when I'm going through suffering. And it makes sense, right? Is a God who loves us still caring for us, still watching over us when we're suffering? But Exodus and the plague specifically answer this question for us with a thunderous yes. The book reveals God's purposes to establish himself as the one true God, not just in Israel, but over all the earth. If we look at the plagues, each in particular, which Joel kind of talked about this last week, but each plague directly confronts an Egyptian God. So God is saying, I am more powerful than any other God. I am the only true God. So just to look at the seventh plague specifically, the Egyptians worshiped this God called Nut. And the goddess Nut was believed to stretch her body over Egypt, over the earth, to protect it from any chaos, any natural disasters from happening. So when Yahweh sends a plague in direct opposition to Pharaoh, he's saying, I am more powerful than any of your gods. Even by the third plague, we see Pharaoh's own magicians confess in Exodus 8, 19, when they try, they're trying to recreate one of the miracles that God is doing, one of the plagues, and they can't. And they say themselves, this is the finger of God. and their own powers are crumbling before them. So as we reflect on these plagues, we see that God, first of all, is making himself known as the only true God, but also we see that he's making himself known as the God over creation. So once again, if you look at the plagues, and you think about the story in Genesis, the creation account, what does God do? He creates the world, and then he finds the earth is void, and disorderly is the point. And he puts all things in order. Each day, he's putting things in a certain order. So he puts the animals in their proper place, and he puts humans over the animals to rule. What happens with the plagues is things are literally turning upside down. The animals that are meant to be in the water are coming onto the land. Think of the frogs. And locusts are swarming and eating everything. Where humans are meant to rule over the animals, now we see animals ruling over the humans. So in this, God is making himself known. I have power over the creation itself. I am the creator God, Yahweh. So the land, once teeming with life, now yields nothing but death, and darkness has returned where God once spoke light. With each plague, the message grows louder. I alone am God, not Pharaoh, not your gods, not your wisdom. I am sovereign over all creation. So imagine a massive decorated throne. It has all the symbols of royalty. There's gold, decorated jewels, all these emblems of beauty, and it's sitting on a great foundation. But as you get closer to this throne and you're analyzing it, you start to notice something. There's actually cracks in the foundation. And when you look at the throne, you see it's actually starting to crumble. This is the reality of Pharaoh's kingship. Pharaoh's power was like that throne, impressive on the surface, but utterly powerless before the true king. The plagues expose all the cracks in Egypt's power structures, showing that Pharaoh is really no god at all. Only Yahweh sits on an unshakable throne. But God isn't just showing this to Egypt and Israel 2,000, 3,000 years ago, whenever this was taking place. God has recorded this today for us to see that we ourselves set up our own thrones. We set up our own false idols and put our trust in the wrong things. So God through the plagues is showing once again, he is the only one with true power and authority over your life. He's the only one that is truly worthy of all your trust. So I ask you, what are you putting your security, your power, where are you finding your identity in today? Because if you're finding all these things in success, maybe financially you're just waiting for that next paycheck, you're waiting for a raise at work, a promotion, maybe you're finding that safety, that security in a relationship, or you're waiting for the perfect person to come into your life and bring that true peace that you're looking for. or maybe on the flip side, you're perfectly fine by yourself, and you've built up walls around you, letting nobody in, giving nobody your trust, because that's where you find peace. And how do you respond when God reveals the insufficiency of those things? Because if you're like me, we all fall into the trap, the snare of putting our trust in things that truly can't hold it. And eventually, those things reveal they can't hold it. They start to break down. And how do we respond? Do our lives fall apart all around us? Do we start to crumble and yell at God? What are you doing, God? If you're like me, you've been through that. And the thing is, what God is actually doing when he allows those things to happen, is he's trying to take your trust from those things and say, look to me. I'm the one that can truly be trusted. The only thing, the only one that can truly be trusted. So even though losing your hope in these lesser idols, these crumbling of our thrones that we set up in our lives, is painful, it hurts, but it's ultimately for our good. Because when we live a life that's free from sin, free from these false hopes, and turn towards God, that's where we find true joy. So this was what God was trying to do through the plagues. This was what God was trying to show Pharaoh and Egypt. And we'll see this in the account of the plague itself. So I'm not gonna reread these next verses, but look down to verses 20 through 26, where we see act number two, the plague of hail. So in this plague, we see the justice of God. Pharaoh has been putting people of Israel through intense slavery. He's been getting increasingly harsh with the people. So God threatens this hailstorm, and as he promised, it comes. And it's unlike anything Egypt has ever seen. It destroyed crops, animals, and even people. But notice this. The place where Israel lived, Goshen, was left untouched. So we see that God's power is just towards Egypt. He is just and in the right to judge them for their wrongdoing. But notice something remarkable. God even warns Pharaoh. In verse 19, he said, bring your livestock and servants inside or they'll be destroyed. And some of Pharaoh's officials even listen. Others don't, but the point is this, that even in his judgment that was right and true and good, he extends mercy. God always provides a way out and provides mercy even in judgment. So when we think about our lives and how this connects, I want you to think about how justice takes place in our lives. How does God show his justice to us in our lives? So imagine a goldsmith refining gold. The process involves intense heat, enough to melt the metal and separate the impurities from the gold. At first, the gold looks ruined. If somebody said, I'm gonna purify your gold, and they took it, threw it in a big pile of metal and melted it down, you'd be like, what are you doing? You're ruining it. If you don't know the whole process, you're like, that's never coming back. But the goldsmith knows exactly how much heat is needed and how long to keep the gold in the flames. The impurities rise to the surface and the goldsmith carefully skims them off, repeating the process over and over until the gold is so pure that he can see his own reflection in it. In the same way, God reveals his justice to us by disciplining us when we sin. And the fire of his justice may feel overwhelming, but it's not meant to destroy us. It's meant to purify us and make us reflect his holiness. You see, like the goldsmith, when he wants to see his reflection in that gold, when God disciplines us, rips out our false idols, rips out our sin, he's actually making us more like himself, and we can see God's reflection in us. So when we think about justice, the thing is we all want it until it's aimed at us, right? When someone wrongs us, we demand justice. God, you gotta get that person back. But when God confronts our sin, we suddenly want mercy, not judgment. So when we sin against somebody, there's often consequences. Maybe we lied to a friend or hurt them, and they confront us, calling out our dishonesty or what we did wrong. And that confrontation is judgment. It can feel like judgment. It feels harsh. It's uncomfortable. It exposes our shortcomings, our failures. And God's discipline for us works similarly. It's his justice confronting our sin, but the purpose of this judgment is always reconciliation. He's always drawing us back to him. He's always extending his mercy to us. He never judges us just for the sake of judgment. It's always for the sake of mercy. And Hebrews 12, six proves this when it says, the Lord disciplines the one he loves. It's like a father who disciplines his son when he does something wrong. He's not doing it just to punish him for the sake of punishment. He doesn't want to just hurt his son. In fact, it's probably painful for him. It should be. But he's doing it because he knows it's shaping his son into a better person. And when God disciplines us, he does it because he loves us. So how, when we see God actually showing our sin to us, revealing our sin, how should we respond? Well, there's three reasons I'll give you on how to embrace God's justice. So first, acknowledge the wrong. When God's disciplining us, when he exposes our sin, whether through a rebuke, maybe you're reading scripture and he shows you something in your life that is complete rebellion against God, don't run from it. Instead, confess it. Admit where you've tried to take his place by demanding right and wrong for yourself. So acknowledge the wrong, confess it to God. Second, accept his correction. Discipline involves uncomfortable consequences. It can involve having to rebuild trust with somebody that we hurt. It can involve facing the loss of finances where we chose to use them the wrong way. But this is where growth happens. God is using these times of grieving or pain to shape us, refining you like a goldsmith fire. So embrace his correction. And three, trust His mercy. Just as God warned Pharaoh's officials, He always offers us a way back. Like I've been saying, He doesn't punish us just to punish us for the sake of discipline. He's inviting us back into relationship with Him. He's inviting us to know Him more. Just like the plagues, we're trying to point Pharaoh to who God truly is, Egypt, all the nations. God uses discipline in our lives, trials in our lives, to point us to who he is, to deeper intimacy with him. When we resist God's discipline, What we're really saying is, I know better, or God, I don't really want you yet. I want to keep living the way I want. But when we embrace the discipline, when we embrace his rules for our lives, we're surrendering to a God who is both just and merciful. A God who doesn't leave us in our sin, but leads us closer to his holiness. And that's ultimately what we want. There's that common phrase among even Christians that says God doesn't want to change you. He just wants you for who you are, which God does want you to come to him wherever you're at, but God doesn't want to leave you exactly the way you are. And that's good news. None of us want to stay exactly who we are. We all recognize tendencies in our lives that we want to see change. We all are setting resolutions for the next year of things we want to see change in our lives. So if God left us, For who we are, that would not be good news. God actually wants to change you, shape you more into the image of his son. And he does this through discipline. He does this through trials. So will you see justice, God's justice, as an enemy or an invitation to trust him more deeply? So we've seen God's declaration to Pharaoh. We've seen the actual plague itself of hail and how God is revealing who he is. He's setting himself apart from all the other gods. He's setting himself apart as God over all creation, over all the earth. He wants his name to be known. And then we see his both justice and mercy being displayed. So how does Pharaoh respond? Act three, Pharaoh's response. So, Pharaoh, he finally gets it. After six plagues, terrible judgments coming on them, he's finally admitting, this time I've sinned, verse 27, this time I've sinned, the Lord is in the right, and I and my people are in the wrong. Oh, wait, but Moses knows better, because in verse 30 he says, I know that you do not yet fear the Lord God, So what is Pharaoh doing here? Is this true repentance? No. Because true repentance isn't just saying, I messed up. It's saying, God, you are Lord. I surrender my life to you. Pharaoh's confession is ultimately superficial. It's just surface level. He's sorry about the consequences of his sin, but he's not sorry about his rebellion. And when we treat God this way, we're really treating him, as C.S. Lewis once talked about, as a divine butler. So think about what a butler does. They come to you when you need them, they serve your every need, and then when you're done with them, they leave. And that's exactly how Pharaoh is treating God here. He's saying, God, I don't want anything to do with you. I want to keep Israel. It's really nice having all of them do my work for me. And God, this hail stuff is really messing up my plan. So can you please get rid of that? Yeah, I'm sorry. But as soon as it stops, what's he do? The Bible tells us he hardens his heart. He goes exactly back to the way he was before and doesn't want anything to do with God. He's not going to let his people go. He's not going to obey his commands. So how easy is it for us to treat God exactly like this? This divine butler, where we only talk to God when we want something from Him, when maybe we have a problem in our lives we need fixed. And once He fixes it, it's like, okay, we forget about God. So I want to ask you, is your faith this morning more about what God can do for you or about surrendering to his authority? Because that's ultimately when we talk about this question, who is the Lord? He is Lord. He is king over all the earth. Knowing God is submitting to him as Lord and king over our lives. He demands our worship. He demands us to recognize his authority. and actually reorient our lives based around that. So we've talked about the declaration, we've talked about the plague, we've talked about Pharaoh's response, how God is making himself known and his justice and mercy. And ultimately, these plagues, being both God's justice on display and his mercy on display, point to the cross of Jesus Christ. Because at the cross of Jesus, justice and mercy reach their greatest point in all of scripture. We see the full judgment of God being poured out on his son. And at the same time, His full mercy being poured out to all the world. I was thinking about this this morning and just how impossible that is to even fathom. It's almost like I was picturing like a nuclear bomb going off of just this incredible explosion that just goes out throughout all the earth. And it's God's justice and mercy at the same time being offered to all humanity, but also knowing all my sin that demands judgment, that demands actually death itself, is poured out on the Son of God. And therefore, I don't have to bear that judgment. So where Pharaoh resisted God's authority, we often do the same. But where Pharaoh's rebellion led to judgment for Egypt, Jesus's obedience led to salvation for all who would place their faith and trust in him. He didn't just take the punishment we deserved, but he actually gave us righteousness, which we don't deserve. How incredible. So he bore the hail, the darkness, the death, so that we could be spared. And this picture of Jesus on the cross, so amazing, actually is reflected in Revelation 5, chapter six, which I think we have on the screen. So it describes Jesus in these verses as a lamb who was slain, says, And between the throne and the four living creatures, and among the elders, I saw a lamb standing as though it had been slain. So we see this picture of Jesus as a slain lamb. And if you're familiar with where we're going with the plagues, you'll see that even in the 10th plague, there is mercy put on display through a lamb that was offered as a sacrifice for the people. Anyone, anyone who made the sacrifice of the lamb, put the blood on their doorposts would be spared. And that lamb was a picture that pointed forward to Jesus, the lamb who was slain for our sins. So where this lamb in Exodus marked a physical exodus from slavery and bondage from Pharaoh, Jesus, the new slain lamb in Revelation is marked as the new exodus for all who would call upon his name. And an exodus not just from a physical enemy, but actually a much greater enemy, sin and death itself. That was the ultimate deliverance we needed, the ultimate exodus we needed. And God delivered us from sin and death through the cross. This is an eternal reality, being freed from sin, but it doesn't stop there, or it doesn't start in eternity. It actually starts right now, because we get to live in victory over sin right now. We are gifted with the freedom to walk in obedience to God's good commands. So how does this reality of Christ bearing your judgment actually change the way you live? How does it shape your desires for God? Does it make you want to know Him more, a God who is so merciful to offer you salvation like this? So the plagues, they show us the consequences of sin. There's death, darkness, separation from God, but they also reveal the Lord for who he is, the God of power, justice, and mercy. So today he invites us to trust him, not just to acknowledge his authority, but to surrender to his love. So Pharaoh asked that question, which we'll return to. Who is the Lord that I should obey him? And the cross answers fully. He is the God who bore our judgment and offers us life. So will you trust him? And believer, this question challenges us daily. Will you resist his authority, or will you worship him as king with your life? Let his power, justice, and mercy fuel your worship, shape your obedience, and drive you to proclaim his name to the ends of the earth. Psalm 2410 says, really asks the question, who is this King of glory? And he gives us a resounding answer. The Lord of hosts. He is the King of glory. May our lives declare this truth. Will you pray with me?