Well, I had a completely different title for this sermon when I was writing it, but I heard a song. It was Psalm 148 that had been adjusted to fit modern English music so you could keep a good meter and actually sing the psalm. When I heard the words of the psalm line up so much with the text, I had to change the name of the sermon to the name of the song. So if you're wondering why it's such a strange title, Even Dragons Shall Him Praise, that is why. But I think the title of our sermons really no more than shorthand memory for our mind to help us remember the text. It's the point of everything, right? It's the point of the scriptures to remember and keep the truth of God in our hearts. And the human heart is the heart of our text tonight. Who is responsible for our sin? Certainly we are. We desire it continually. We are trapped in the cycle of sin because we desire it. And because of the curse of sin, we sin and desire it more. So sin becomes its own punishment, constantly digging ourselves deeper and deeper in the spiral of sin, as John mentioned this morning. So the question is, how do we get out of the cycle? How can we ever be righteous and how can we ever be free of this curse? Our text tonight will make that very plain if you would please turn to Exodus chapter 7 The Lord said to Moses See I have made you like God to Pharaoh and your brother Aaron shall be your prophet You shall speak all that I command you and your brother Aaron shall 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 to you. Then I will lay my hand on Egypt and bring my host, my people, the children of Israel, out of the land of Egypt by great acts of judgment. The Egyptians shall know that I am the Lord I stretch out my hand against Egypt and bring out the people of Israel from among them. And Moses and Aaron did so. So they did just as the Lord commanded them. Now Moses was 80 years old and Aaron was 83 years old. And they spoke to Pharaoh. Then the Lord said to Moses and Aaron, when Pharaoh says to you, prove yourselves by working a miracle, And you shall say to Aaron, take your staff and cast it down before Pharaoh, that it may become a serpent. So Moses and Aaron went to Pharaoh and did just as the Lord commanded. Aaron cast down his staff before Pharaoh and his servants, and it became a serpent. Pharaoh summoned the wise men and the sorcerers, and they and the magicians of Egypt also did the same by their secret arts. For each man cast down his staff, and they became serpents. But Aaron's staff swallowed up their staffs, so Pharaoh's heart was hardened, and he would not listen to them as the Lord had said. Please bow your heads with me. Almighty God, we stand in your presence tonight to hear your word. to stare in the mirror of your word and to have it look back into our hearts. Lord, whatever we see, let it work in our hearts for change, for the truth of your word to take root and hold in our hearts that we may actually become the new creatures that we read about. Soften our hearts to love and obey you, And Lord, whatever I preach tonight, let me disappear. Speak to your people by your word. Shut my mouth. Pray all these things in the name of Jesus Christ, our Lord. Amen. So the Lord said, I have made you like God to Pharaoh. You stand before him, it will be as if He is standing before Elohim. Aaron speaks for you as the prophets will one day speak for me. You will deliver my counsel and you will speak with my authority. Your words have been given to you by me, Moses. Even still, Pharaoh won't listen. So you will even work signs and wonders by my power to prove your legitimacy, that I have sent you, that you are my servant, and your mission is divine. But he will not believe you, because I myself, says verse two. You don't see this in English, but it says, I, I, in Hebrew. I, I will harden his heart. It repeats itself emphatically to show that I am, is responsible for the hardening or softening of dead man's hearts. Moses was so concerned with his uncircumcised lips, his stuttering, his speech impediment, whatever it was, that he missed every time the Lord said, Pharaoh's not even going to listen. He heard God tell him multiple times at this point, Pharaoh will not heed the Lord's command. But he obviously thought that when he brought the word of the Lord, the word of the Almighty to Pharaoh, that surely he would indeed listen, especially if the right fiction was used. At one point previously, he was so concerned with this, he even angered God. Now Aaron would be the one to speak directly to Pharaoh for Moses. So we see, oddly enough, the first game of telephone being played in Scripture. God told Moses what he would say to Aaron, and Aaron gave the command on to Pharaoh. But even here and now in this moment, in this passage right here, God tells him once more Don't be discouraged. Just obey me. Pharaoh is not going to listen. So how many times when you read a passage like this do you think of a time in your life where you have proclaimed the gospel of reconciliation to the king's rebellious subjects, only to find that his word, the word that you know from experience, is quick and powerful. It transcends culture. It transcends time and intellect. and it cuts right to the heart of the matter, but in this moment, it feels like you're shooting spitballs at a battleship with 16 inches of armor in a plate hole. Why? Because it has nothing to do with you, your oration, your style, how together you look. How could Christ himself preach and everyone there not believe? because the word is for those with ears to hear. Or in other words, those whose spirits, the spirit of God in his mercy has already softened and prepared to hear these words on a spiritual level. We are responsible to convey God's message in love. We are not responsible for those who hear it to receive it. words on the page come alive and affect the heart by the illumination of the spirit of God working in the hearts of those whom he may choose. Not by your melodious voice or five dollar theological terms. I, I says the Lord. It is his justice that hardens the hearts of all men as they deserve. And it is him and him alone that softens the understand, the under, yes, excuse me, the undeserving and the stubborn heart in His mercy. So how does He harden their hearts? He gives them over to their sin. Sin becomes its own judgment because it is self-destructive and even self-compounding for every intentional sin. You will make a hundred more unintentional sins, and they will take you much further and more out of you than you are willing to pay. And so he turns sinful men over to their sin, no longer restraining them from the evil that they desire. And as they get their desire and indulge in more sin, they hate God all the more. But even in this, he goes on with one more warning. He goes on in verse four about his discipline. I will lay my hand on Egypt. Imagine a father prompting an insubordinate child with a hand on the shoulder, making it clear that they are in trouble, but then they continue in disobedience and rebellion. That hand will become a punishing arm, and the Lord will bring his people out of the land bondage by acts of terrible judgment, so that Egypt, that rebellious subject, will know that He is God. Can you hear His voice in that simultaneous judgment and redemption? You will know that I am the Lord. This is, once again, the Lord, all caps. This isn't the Lord as a title. This is the Lord God. This is His name. You will know Yahweh is God. Another problem we have with this text is we don't understand what God is or what it means. We think the word is a descriptor of a particular office. It's your boss or something. He's just that other guy in charge. He's, you know, like above your boss and maybe above the president, depending on how you feel about God. Well, God is a descriptor of a particular and unique being. And yes, he does have an office and position over all things, but we are far too used to these generic and anthropomorphized ideas of who and what God is. He is the pinnacle of all beings. There is nothing above him. He is the only autonomous, independent, omnipotent, omnipresent, sovereign, triune God who is named of himself. When is the last time? How autonomous are you? Can you name yourself? Have you named yourself? Yeah, you can go legally change it in record in court, but you haven't actually changed your name, not the name that people knew you by all your life. and will still know you as the I Am named himself. The same God whom you have no choice but to accidentally utter your creator's name with every breath. Have you ever heard Yahweh? It's inhale, exhale. You cannot inhale and exhale without saying his name, whether you want to or not. It doesn't matter how hard you hate God. And even if all of these words still fall short, he is Yahweh. He will reveal himself to every person as either a righteous judge or a merciful redeemer. He is so great, in fact, he will single-handedly rescue his army. Now, that sounds strange, doesn't it? But it's right there in verse 4. He says, I will bring out my host from the land. Now everywhere else in scripture, host is an army. And it doesn't really change here. Check the words. It still says host in its definition. It still says army. So he's not speaking about his heavenly host either. His angels aren't in bondage in Egypt. These are his people. and they are his host. The beautiful thing is, his army is not idle. Even though he's doing all the heavy lifting. Even though he's taking them out of Egypt. Even though they will plunder Egypt without so much as a stick in their hands, God is the one who did it. God is the one who caused it to come to pass. And he, even though he is the one that conquers Egypt, lavishes them with all of the spoils that they didn't earn. He fights for them. His army is there for the spoils, and to see the revelation of the glory of God, and to witness his awesome deeds. Why? So that they will sing his praise, because everything's for the glory of God. It's like this event could continue on into Jehoshaphat's story, right? You remember the story of the king who never fought his battle? The army marched behind the choir, and they sang the praises of God, and when they arrived at the battlefield, the enemy was slain, routed, or otherwise not there. We see this theme continue on through scripture. And you can find that story in 2 Chronicles 20 if you need to look it up for yourself. And sometimes I wonder if, knowing Fullwell, let me be clear, I know Paul had Christ's work in his mind when he talked about being more than conquerors, but sometimes I wonder if he saw the same theme repeating over and over in Scripture to give him that idea. The idea that he summed up in Romans 8, 37 when he said, we are more than conquerors in Christ because the Lord is mighty and he is merciful and he is our champion. For us, he has raised a horn of his salvation. And then continuing on in verse six, we read that Moses and Aaron obeyed God and took his command before Pharaoh." Now, why does it say that? We can see by the story progression that Moses and Aaron did obey God. We have the rest of Exodus to show that. Why waste these words telling us that they obeyed? Well, since God doesn't use any idle words and every word of Scripture must be important, deeds also must be important. Why would he say this? I think we need to take note of the fact that this underscores the reality that God's sovereign power, that in his sovereign power, he executes his will via the actions of his subjects. This reminds us that the outcomes that God promises and wills are not our responsibility, but they are being sovereignly worked out by His providence in His people, that we are to trust and obey so that the Lord's will will come to pass. Not that we have to be concerned about it. Everything is in the care of God Almighty. But we are participating in His will because, once again, He is generous and merciful toward His people. And then as we go on, we see at this point, God has given his commands and promises. We've gone before Pharaoh, we've given the command to Pharaoh, and Pharaoh, of course, doesn't believe just as the Lord says. What does he say? He says, show me a sign. I don't believe you and I don't want to believe you is really what the undertones are. As we can see, the outcome of this is far from what we would have in mind if we were thinking, I'm going to present someone with the Word of God, the powerful Word of God that is irresistible. There's no way he cannot listen. But he does, because God has hardened his heart. So the tyrant king, who wasn't keen to obey the command of the Lord, says, prove it. Show me a sign, and Matthew recounts for us a wildly similar event in Matthew chapter 12, verse 38, when it says, Some of the scribes and Pharisees answered him, saying, Teacher, we wish to see a sign from you. But he answered them, It is an evil and adulterous generation that seeks for a sign, but no sign will be given to it except for the sign of the prophet Jonah. For just as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of a great fish, So will the Son of Man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth. And the men of Nineveh will rise up at the judgment of this generation and condemn it, for they repented at the preaching of Jonah. And behold, something greater than Jonah is here." See, Jesus knows our hearts. He knows us. That ridiculous commercial that says he gets us. Yes, he does. He very much does get us. He just doesn't leave us where he got us. He knows us. And he knows full well that while divine, while they define, excuse me, while they verify, define authority, signs and wonders do not produce faith. Faith is a gift by God through grace alone. The Pharisees would have the sign of Jonah. That Christ would spend three days in the belly of death preceding his marvelous resurrection. If you won't believe this sign, no other one would do either. And yet something greater than Jonah is here. The Logos. The Word of God. If you're hearing me right now, the Word of God has come to you. So repent and believe. Even the wicked people of Nineveh listen to the Word of God and repent it. Not Pharaoh. Not with his hardened heart. And then in this same passage of Christ, we have a really strange connection that takes us right back to Exodus. This word, great fish, it's ketos. It's the Greek word for sea monster. If you read any of the Greek classics or histories, you will hear this word used as sea monster. Suddenly, we find a strange connection with Jonah. The whole story makes a lot more sense when we're not trying to fit him in a fish or a whale, which it never says whale. It's a sea monster. It's a strange thing because we find the same definition for serpent. The most notable Ketos were described as colossal, being as big as ships, and serpentine, even having many similarities to dragons. And now, you're also thinking, is serpent in Exodus is not ketos, though. It's not sea monster. It doesn't say sea monster. Yeah, yeah, you're right, but hang on, hang on. The Hebrew word kanin also has a broader range of meaning. It's serpent. It includes, you guessed it, sea monster. It, in fact, in its range of meaning, it means sea monster, dragon, serpent, and crocodile in that order of the number of times used. So, now I want to be clear. This word was written down by Moses as the direction of the Holy Spirit. He does not carelessly choose his words. The Holy Spirit is not idle about what he recorded. And that is why it makes me certain that he chose this word because of its entire range of meaning. It connects to Scripture all over the place. We have the connection of the serpent and the dragon all over the place in Scripture. The dragon especially in Revelation. And let's not forget that Revelation wasn't even written at this time, so we can see that God had the further parts of Scripture already in mind at this time. And then we see the sea monster connecting us to the words of Christ through Jonah, rebuking those who seek signs but yet ignore the message of God, like you before you believed, and like Pharaoh here before the prophet of God, who had, by the way, no intent to repent and believe. He demanded a sign because his cold, dead heart did not want to believe. If Moses and Aaron could not verify The message that they were bringing was from the Word of God. By offering him a sign, Pharaoh could go on in disbelief. It would be a very easy thing to do to say, they have no divine backing. They have no divine authority. I don't have to listen to them. And so we see that Moses and Aaron are proving, once again, proving their divine authority, not instilling faith in Pharaoh. just like the scribes and Pharisees who came to Jesus. And then there was that really, really weird part of the definition, what's the name? The crocodile. Now this message being specifically for Egypt, the crocodile would have great implications. So much so that it causes me to wonder if it wasn't a snake, as we often interpret serpent to be, but a crocodile, that the staff became. I don't know. I'm not saying it is. I'm not saying we should change scripture. But it's worth considering and thinking about. If you remember John's illustration this morning of the stepping stones, God speaks to the people that he is coming to in ways that they can understand. sends a decree to us in such a way as we can relate to it, and that there is no excuse when a man heartily rejects the word of God. Such example, such as God condescending to man. He came to us in a way that we can relate to him as another human. Of course, that's not the only reason for that, but it's included in there. And so we see with the definition of a crocodile. Crocodiles would be pretty important to the Egyptians because this is the revered symbol of Sobek. He's one of the more prominent Egyptian gods. Carvings and live and mummified crocodiles adorned his temple, Crocodilopolis. And yes, that was the real temple. Now you've probably even seen pictures of the hieroglyphs that depict a man with the head of a crocodile. This was Sobek. He was believed to be an all-consuming God, but unlike Jehovah, who consumes all sin like a cleansing flame, Sobek devoured even those who may love him. He was the perfect symbol of the cycle of sin. He was considered to be a healer, even resurrecting and healing one of the foremost gods of the Egyptian pantheon, Osiris. Sobek was the god of the water, the Nile, and man's virility, his seed, to use a biblical scripture. So what we find is we have Sobek, who is clearly a false copy or misunderstanding of the Holy Spirit and his true power of creation and resurrection. In fact, I believe it It proves the Genesis recounting of the earth's repopulation by Noah's sons. To have such a false and perverse and twisted view of the Holy Spirit, you have to begin at what was at one point a correct view of the Holy Spirit. So we see as Noah's sons repopulating the earth and moving down into Egypt, the case for Soback being the perversion of the understanding of scripture over time, the product of the sinful lens of mankind. And so imagine if you're a pharaoh and you have this understanding of what a crocodile is, and now we see this crocodile come out of Moses' staff, right? He'll be beside himself. That's my guy. Why is my God on your side? My God's the real God, right? The real God can't be on your side, because he's on my side. Just whose side is Sobek on here? Was the power of the gods really on Moses' side? Maybe he didn't intend to counter Moses' sign so much as he did to clear his own confusion or stop his world spinning. Maybe it was panic when he called for the sorcerers. And last but not least, in the definition of this word, t'nin, certainly not least by a long shot, we come to the serpent itself. So after my last point, you might say, do you argue to change scripture? No, even though. Crocodile fits in so well and if God used that to communicate to the Egyptians in a way that they would understand It was more important the way he communicates to his own people Because we are accepting it by his grace So therefore we need to understand it and respond to it Serpent can't change it is clear that Moses understood this theme that was already beginning and just Genesis and Exodus of the serpent And it this word should not be confused directly with snake. This is a different word. There's a separate word for snake But Moses still grasped the theme right and uses the word serpent now The serpent This theme stretches out and reaches all the way from Genesis into Revelation. Even from Genesis 3, when that particular serpent hissed in the ear of Eve, God is holding out on you under his words. When the Lord promised, even after that, that the serpent would bruise the heel of her seed, but the great I Am would crush the serpent's head and break the cycles and the curse of sin. curse of sin often symbolized in that self-devouring serpent, that ring. Now here, before Pharaoh and Moses, these wicked magicians filled with demonic power, this is not Penn and Teller, this is not David Copperfield, answered the sign of the rod given by God himself with what they perceived to be an equal show of power. But then Aaron's staff swallowed them up. Is it an equal show of power when the symbol of Egypt devours symbols of Egypt? Or when the symbol of the curse itself devours a symbol of the curse itself? Doesn't this signify the power of the true and living God is here before you? He is mighty, mightier than all of these demon powers at once. and not by a little bit, mind you, his greater by infinite orders of magnitude. So none could stand before his judgment, and he didn't come to take prisoners, but to obliterate the sin. Now, in one of the most beautiful foreshadows in scripture, serpents were being devoured by serpents. God would direct his hard-hearted opposition to defeat itself. The wisdom of God would direct the rebellious principalities to undo themselves. As you've heard John mentioned before, one of his professors say, God would direct sin in a sinless way. And as Paul explains to us in 1 Corinthians 2, 8, none of the rulers at this age understood this, for if they had, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory. They would not have gone through with their plan if they knew it was the very design of the Father all along. They did not mean by their wicked deed to execute God's plan to give his sinless life as payment for sinful man. Forces of darkness did not intend for Christ's death to be a vicarious sacrifice that would release the people they had in bondage, the bondage of sin and death. But there in the most wicked and abominable act of sin ever committed by man or demon, the omnipotent wrath of God collided with His immeasurable mercy and the most magnificent display of love to end the power of sin and the reign of the serpent over God's people. That's why the imagery in Numbers 21 of the serpent being raised up on the wood, even though Christ was the one crucified, it was the serpent, it was the sin, it was the curse itself that was actually defeated on the cross. And so with all of this happening right before his very eyes, the words of the Almighty God coming straight to him, these signs and these shadows, even if he did not really truly recognize what these shadows were, why didn't Pharaoh believe? I would say to whoever may hear, do you mean the same story with the same truth that was just replayed in front of you? Those who don't believe, in the words of Doug Wilson, have hearts of beef jerky. And I will add dead, dry, and hard, the real saddle leather kind. If God in his justice does not choose to revive our dead hearts, we will continue on the path to death and our sin, the very path that we have earned. The fact of history is that Pharaoh was a vessel of wrath, prepared for destruction in order to reveal the glory of God through his power and justice. And some might ask, isn't it cruel? Could God be so wicked as to leave us in our sin? If we need him to work in our hearts before we can believe, isn't it wrong for him to leave sinners in such a state or to even further harden their hearts? No, my friends, it is justice. It is all that rebellious sinners have earned by their wicked deeds. We remember the cost of even one sin is death. How many sins have you committed? There are 86,400 seconds in a day. Have you spent each one of them in humble and grateful attitude for all that God has done? For the fact that you are alive, that you were created, that you are sustained by his very existence, his power, his will, So I repeat, isn't it cruel for God to leave us in our sin? No. It is all that we have earned. The proper question is why were any of us ever the objects of his great love? Why does anyone receive mercy? We who are also overflowing with evil continuously have been given grace upon grace. so much that those who experience the regeneration of their hearts will find salvation by grace alone, and the burden of our tainted righteousness can be released. God frees his elect from the curse and softened our hearts to flesh again, that we may choose to submit to him and forego our rebellion. Some may ask, how do I know I am not the vessel of wrath to be destroyed? How do I know God hasn't chosen me as his elect? The fact of the matter is, if you are convicted of sin, that is the work of the Spirit, and you are being called to repentance. 1 Timothy 2 tells us that God desires that all men will come to the knowledge of the truth, and there is one Messiah who gave himself as a ransom for all. Jesus told us that he would never turn away any that come to him in humility by the Spirit of God, And by that same Spirit of God, I can choose to obey the command of God the Father and believe on His one and only Son, Jesus the Messiah, our King. And by that same Spirit, from His mercy, you can too. When your faith alone is in Christ alone, He will lavish you with His mercy and clothe you with the only real righteousness in the entire cosmos. And you will have a peace and a fellowship with God, who is the Lord of all. He will place his seal on you. And by his spirit, who is mighty to keep you, he will teach you and guide you and preserve you until the trials of that final day are over. Now, maybe by grace alone, you have already placed your faith alone in Christ alone. Maybe you are already part of his host. What is the application of this passage for us? Well, act like it. Him led his armies praise, exalt his merciful name. And if you have trouble with that, remember, never forget you are clinging to the hope and promises of his mercy. And that is it. Yes, it is not you that have a hold on him, but he that grips you. And yes, you can trust him, but we don't presume upon his mercy. It's not because his mercy isn't trustworthy. It's not because his mercy will ever run out. It's not because he doesn't just heap it on us more than we need and can use, more than we can even fathom. Because He absolutely does. But because He is absolutely deserving of our thankfulness. The thankfulness that we show in the joy of our obedience and through the praise that should be continually on our lips and by continuing to petition for His mercy regularly. Because we understand that though grace is free, it isn't cheap. It was paid for by the blood of Christ. And so, may our merciful Father ever soften your heart's dear body. Amen.