Go ye, serve the Lord; only let your flocks and your herds be stayed.” Exodus 10 v 24 Just so. What does Moses say to that? “Thou must give us also sacrifices and burnt-offerings, that we may sacrifice unto Jehovah our God. Our cattle also shall go with us; there shall not a hoof be left behind; for thereof must we take to serve the Lord our God; and we know not with what we must serve the Lord, until we come thither.” This was the divine policy of “No surrender,” and I plead for it with you. Satan says, “Do not use your property for God. Do not use your talents and your abilities; especially, do not use your money for the Lord Jesus. Keep that for yourself. You will want it one of these days, perhaps. Keep it for your own enjoyment. Live to God in other things, but, as to that, live to yourself.” Now, a genuine Christian says, “When I gave myself to the Lord I gave him everything I had. From the crown of my head to the sole of my foot I am the Lord’s. He bids me provide things ho...

    COLOSSIANS 1:12–14   … giving thanks to the Father, who has qualified us to share in the inheritance of the saints in Light. For He rescued us from the domain of darkness, and transferred us to the kingdom of His beloved Son, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins. This segment of Col. 1 forms part of the prayer begun in verse 9. Paul begins by praying that the readers will be “filled” with God’s wisdom so that they “will walk in a manner worthy of the Lord, to please Him in all respects” (v. 10a). This goal is to be reached by means of “bearing fruit … and increasing in the knowledge of God” and being “strengthened with all power, … giving thanks to the Father” (vv. 10b–11). Verses 12b–14 give the reason for the thanksgiving, which is rooted in the language of Israel’s exodus and subsequent inheritance of the promised land. While there is not likely one OT passage in mind about the exodus and land inheritance, the broad tradition describing Isra...

Those who continually choose falsehood will be inextricably caught by it. In the words of Proverbs 5:22, “His own iniquities will capture the wicked, and he will be held with the cords of his sin.” They will be abandoned by God to the consequences of their choice to reject the gospel. The story of Pharaoh is a grim reminder that God will judicially harden the hearts of those who persist in hardening their hearts against the truth. Because Pharaoh hardened his heart (Ex. 8:15, 32; 9:34; 1 Sam. 6:6), God hardened Pharaoh’s heart, fixing him in a path from which he could never return (Ex. 4:21; 7:3; 9:12; 10:1, 20, 27; 11:10; 14:4, 8). In Isaiah 6:9–10, a passage quoted repeatedly in the New Testament (Matt. 13:14–15; Mark 4:12; Luke 8:10; John 12:40; Acts 28:26–27; Rom. 11:8), God said to Isaiah, “Go, and tell this people: ‘Keep on listening, but do not perceive; keep on looking, but do not understand.’ Render the hearts of this people insensitive, their ears dull, and their eyes ...

THE CRUSHING PLAGUES have followed their ordained sequence. Repeatedly, Pharaoh hardened his heart; yet, however culpable this man was, God sovereignly moved behind the scenes, actually warning Pharaoh, implicitly inviting repentance. For instance, through Moses God had already said to Pharaoh, “I have raised you up for this very purpose, that I might show you my power and that my name might be proclaimed in all the earth. You still set yourself against my people and will not let them go” (9:16–17). Yet now Pharaoh’s patience entirely collapses. He warns Moses that he is not to appear in the court again: “The day you see my face you will die” (10:28). Carson, D. A. (1998). For the love of God: a daily companion for discovering the riches of God’s Word. (Vol. 1). Wheaton, IL: Crossway Books.

God’s hardening of Pharaoh to damnation illustrates his justice and wrath against a murderer and a cruel taskmaster, not a double predestination . In fact, Pharaoh himself confesses that he and his people are wicked and that I AM is righteous (Exod. 9:27). Though he concedes he has sinned (9:30), he does not fear I AM, and after the ninth plague, he explodes and throws “God” (i.e. Moses) out of his sight (10:28), setting the stage for the climactic tenth plague. Through hardening Pharaoh’s heart, the Moral Governor of the universe shows that he rules creation and history and deals with the creation according to his moral pleasure, determining how long he will extend his grace and varying the degrees and kinds of judgments he inflicts. Amazingly, God hardens Pharaoh’s wicked heart by escalating his signs and wonders (Exod. 4:21; 7:3, 13, 14, 22; 8:19 [15], 32 [28]; 9:7, 12, 34, 35; 10:1, 20, 27; 11:10; 14:4, 8). Signs and wonders that melt a tender heart (see 2 Kings 22:19; cf. Job 23:...

Tenth Sign: Ninth Plague: Darkness (10:21–29) To appreciate fully this plague account, one must understand how ominously darkness threatened ancient people. We travel easily at night with the aid of various forms of electric lighting; they were virtually immobilized by the darkness of nighttime unless the night was cloudless and the moon relatively full. Although some ancient professional caravaneers could travel partly at night, they were able to do so mainly at times other than the dark of the moon but only because their animals could see better at night than they could and especially because they traveled on well-defined, well-remembered paths. Straying from those paths in darkness could be fatal. We can be active at night because our homes and places of work can be cheaply illumined; they closed up their cities at night,177 barred their courtyard gates, and locked their house doors. People abroad in the nighttime were assumed to be criminals and, typically, in fact were. We f...

Horton, M. (2011). The Christian Faith: A Systematic Theology for Pilgrims on the Way (p. 652). Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan.

This post comes from The Gospel Coalition. Christian Living  /  Greg Gilbert  (click here) The Church Is an Embassy, Not a Social Club January 8, 2016 Here's a question for you: Do you need to attend church to be a Christian? What about being a member of a church? Is that necessary for a believer to grow and mature as God intends? To hear many Christians talk—and this would probably be the opinion of many more if you could read their thoughts—the idea of being a vital, connected member of a church seems strange, unnecessary, maybe even a little antiquated. After all, if the goal is to grow as a Christian—to learn more about God, to understand and act out our faith more consistently—why should we think the church is so important? The best Bible teachers on the planet podcast their preaching; there are energetic parachurch organizations where a Christian can serve well; and a small group meeting in a home provides excellent opportunity for fellow...

The True Meaning of Purity The word which is translated “pure” here was used in several ways in the original Greek language. For one thing, it was often used to mean something that was unadulterated or unmixed with anything foreign, such as pure gold which has not been mixed with any other metal, or milk which has not been watered down. Or again, it often simply meant “clean,” like a dish which had been thoroughly washed or clothes that had been scrubbed. Now apply those meanings to “pure in heart.” If we are truly pure in our hearts, we will have a single -minded devotion to the will of God. Our motives will be unmixed, our thoughts will not be adulterated with those things which are not right. And our hearts will be clean, because we will not tolerate known sin in our hearts and allow it to pollute us. We will take seriously the Bible’s promise, “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just ...