Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Speaker A: Foreign.
[00:00:04] Speaker B: Welcome to Hope for Today, a weekly Bible teaching program that will bring you hope for every day.
We are happy to be here with you today. Welcome and thank you for joining us. We are heralds of hope and our goal is to use media to like radio, Internet and books to make disciples of Jesus Christ to accomplish the Great Commission in our lifetime. Think about that. Do you think it is possible to accomplish the Great Commission?
Can we go everywhere and teach all nations?
Do you think we have the resources necessary to accomplish this? I would say yes, if God's people will align our hearts with his and funding will not be a problem. The hard part is keeping our hearts in line with His.
As followers of Jesus, we must focus on going and teaching here at Heralds of Hope. We believe it is possible and we plan to do our part as God leads us.
This belief leads us to teach the Bible via radio like this.
So if you can turn with us now to Exodus, we will continue our journey through this Old Testament book with our Bible teacher J. Mark Horst. And here he is to teach us today's lesson.
[00:01:31] Speaker A: The burdens of life come to us from different sources and they take different shapes and forms.
Do you ever feel like you're going to break down under the weight of your burdens?
Have you just about exhausted your strength to endure?
The title of this message is a How much can you endure?
I believe the cruelty some men practice must come straight from the pit of hell, straight from the devil himself.
We read about some of them in other times, like ancient Sodom and Gomorrah.
In more modern times we have the horrors of Stalinist Russia in the 1930s, which led to nearly 4 million deaths.
And not long after that, Nazi Germany and the Holocaust, which led to millions more being put to death.
Some powerful leaders seem to be motivated by demonic spirits.
The scripture for this meditation is Exodus chapter 5 and verses 15 to 23.
It is an experience of great suffering that the people of Israel endured many years ago when they were slaves in the land of Egypt.
And we will find here some deep lessons for us today.
So follow along in your Bible as I read that text, Exodus 5, 15:23 then the officers of the children of Israel came and cried unto Pharaoh, saying, why do you deal this way with your servants?
There is no straw given to us. And yet they say to us, make brick and behold your servants are beaten. But the fault is with your own people.
But Pharaoh said, you are idle. You are idle. That's why you say, let us go and do sacrifice to the Lord.
So go Therefore, now and work, for there shall no straw be given to you, and yet you shall deliver the same amount of bricks.
And the officers of the children of Israel saw that they were in an impossible situation.
After it was said, you shall not diminish the number of bricks from your daily quota.
And they met Moses and Aaron, who stood in the way as they came forth from Pharaoh. And they said to them, the lord, look upon you and judge, because you have made us to be hated in the eyes of Pharaoh and in the eyes of his servants to put a sword in their hand to kill us.
And Moses returned to the Lord and said, lord, why have you so evilly entreated this people?
Why is it that you have sent me here?
For since I came to Pharaoh to speak in your name, he has done evil to this people.
Neither have you delivered this people at all.
In this text, you can see the results when people are called to go through great trial.
It will help you find answers to my question, how much can you endure?
The experiences of the Bible characters are like ours, and we can take courage and gather hope from these results.
The first result was the impossible demand.
I observed something interesting about this experience.
The officers of the children of Israel had access to the king's court.
That's unusual.
They went to make their appeal before the highest person in the land.
It is unusual. I would also say it's commendable. The people of the land had access to the ruler of the country.
And so these officers went to him to make their appeal.
And when they went, they raised the question, why do you deal like this with your servants? In other words, why are you treating us this way?
They tried to impress upon Pharaoh that they were faithful servants.
They weren't trying to take advantage of the king, and they weren't trying to get out of their work.
They were trying to fulfill his demands. But he, by his commands, was making it impossible.
And they said to him, what you have asked us to do is completely impossible.
You have made an unreasonable demand.
It is a requirement we can't fulfill.
You have taken away our resources, and yet you still expect that we can do the same amount of work, that we can make the same amount of bricks. That's impossible.
We can't continue as we have been because we do not have the materials that are necessary to do the job.
And then they went on to analyze where the problem lay. They said, the fault isn't with us. The fault is with your people.
They were making demands of us which we cannot fill under any circumstances.
It's Impossible.
Now, let's draw some comfort from this.
When there is an impossible demand, let's try to find a way to make an appeal to those who are responsible.
That's what the officers of the people of Israel did. They laid their case before Pharaoh. He was the one who was responsible.
They told him, we want to accomplish your goals, but we can't do that under the current circumstances.
That appeal showed their courage, and it should give us some hope.
The second result then, is the impatience of Pharaoh.
Now, even though the officers of Israel had access to the highest leader of the land, the king of Egypt, he falsely accused them. He wouldn't consider their case at all.
Rather, he immediately rendered a judgment against them. And that judgment was wrong. He said, you're idle. You have nothing to do. You have too much time on your hands. And that's the reason why this situation has developed. That is why you want to go and sacrifice to the Lord, because you don't have enough to do.
So he refused to diminish his harsh commands. In fact, he sent them back to work. By these go now and work. You shall have nothing, but you shall produce what I have required of you.
Can you imagine how disappointing that was to these men?
Now they had to go back to their people and tell them what Pharaoh had said.
I'm sure those men dreaded the idea of having to go back with such unwelcome news.
The officers who had presented their case to Pharaoh concluded that they were in a really serious situation.
They were in an evil case or impossible situation.
There was no relaxation by the king of the requirements that he had laid upon them. In fact, he rather expressed great impatience with them that they were not doing their job as they were supposed to. And then he sent them back to their heavy tasks.
There would be no relief for them and no relief for those who were under their oversight.
The king's command placed them in an impossible position.
Sometimes you and I undergo great stress and trouble. We too are required to endure the impatience of our superiors, maybe even their verbal or physical abuse.
Some of them may never have had any experience in the task that we are called to do. They don't know what it's like to work hard and get their hands dirty.
But let's gather some courage and hope so that we do not go down in defeat and despair during times of great distress and demand.
In the New Testament, in the Book of First Peter, we read these.
Therefore humble yourselves under the mighty hand of God that he may exalt you in due time.
Listen, casting all your Care upon him because he cares for you.
So don't be bitter, but cast your anxieties on the Lord. He will sustain you.
And then we see a third result emerging out of this experience.
The implication of the officers.
When the officers left Pharaoh to return to their work, they met Moses and Aaron. Now, most likely, Moses and Aaron were waiting for them as they came from the palace. They wanted to know what they were told.
These officers began to judge Moses and Aaron. They laid the blame for their burdens on them. They said, the Lord, look upon you and judge. Because since you have come, the situation is much more difficult than before you were here. You have made us hated before the eyes of Pharaoh and in the eyes of his servants. And so the end result is that we are all going to be killed.
Moses immediately took that to heart.
He went to the Lord because the Lord had sent him. He hadn't come on his own.
And then, in his complaint to God, Moses laid it right on the line, as we say. He said, here I am. I have come to bring out the people. And instead of bringing them out, you have dealt badly with them.
He reviewed before the Lord what the officers had said to him.
Try to imagine the feelings Moses had after this denunciation by his fellow Israelites.
In suffering, we are often beset by such results.
In these historical situations. We see things that are similar to what we face today.
And that's because human nature hasn't changed in all these centuries.
Men without God are still proud and arrogant and vengeful in their dealings with others.
Those in power still take advantage of the weak and the powerless.
But don't forget this, my friend. Someone is watching.
So take courage. It may appear at the moment like God has forgotten you.
You may go through all these trials and troubles, the impossible demands, the impatience of your superiors, and perhaps even the feeling that God has forgotten you.
But he hasn't. Take courage. Because God has a way with Him. You will be able to do much more than you ever thought possible.
He is faithful. Trust Him.
[00:11:43] Speaker B: Thanks, J. Mark, for teaching us more from Exodus. And thank you for being there. If you would like this teaching, or if you have any questions, please feel free to reach out to us. I'll give you our information shortly.
I love how Exodus teaches us that God is is in control and he is at work.
He always has been and he always will be.
We can trust him right now, no matter what we are experiencing.
We won't always understand him, but we can trust Him. His timing might be different than ours. Think about Moses and he might not do what we think he should be doing.
Remember what happened to Joseph.
However, we have the benefit of looking back at many years of history and we see God is sovereign. His purposes will be accomplished.
This is his story and he is the author.
If you are interested, we have a study guide for Exodus available.
It is a small booklet designed to help you learn more from each of these lessons.
We call it the Hope Herald and if you would like one, all you have to do is ask.
Here is how you can connect with us.
One of the best ways is via email. Our email address is maileraldsofhope.org if you don't have email, you can send us a letter. Our address is HopeFor Today, Box 3, Breezewood, Pa 15533 or you can connect with us on our website. Our website is heraldsofhope.org While you're there, please look around for more teaching like this on our website. You will also find other resources available from Heralds of Hope. Again, the website is heraldsofhope.org thanks again for joining us for today's program. I encourage you to join us again next week as we continue our study in Exodus. We look forward to being with you then. And we'll leave you with a verse from 1 Corinthians 10 so whether you eat or drink or whatever you do, do it all for the glory of God.
Blessings to you as you glorify Him.
