This morning, I invite you to turn to the second book of the Bible, the book of Exodus. We're returning to our study in this book as we're working through it. And this morning, we come to the eighth plague. We're almost there to their deliverance out of the land of Egypt. And this morning, this is Exodus chapter 10. Exodus chapter 10. beginning at verse 1, the locusts, the locust plague. This is the word of the Lord. Then the Lord said to Moses, Go into Pharaoh, for I have hardened his heart and the heart of his servants, that I may show these signs of mine among them, and that you may tell in the hearing of your son and of your grandson how I have dealt harshly with the Egyptians and what signs I have done among them, that you may know that I am the Lord. So Moses and Aaron went into Pharaoh and said to him, Thus says the Lord God, the God of the Hebrews, How long will you refuse to humble yourself before me? Let my people go that they may serve me. For if you refuse to let my people go, behold, tomorrow I will bring locusts into your country, and they shall cover the face of the land, so that no one shall see the land. and they shall eat what is left to you after the hail, and they shall eat every tree of yours that grows in the field, and they shall fill your houses and the houses of all your servants and of all the Egyptians, as neither your fathers nor your grandfathers have seen from the day they came on earth to this day. Then he turned and went out from Pharaoh. Then Pharaoh's servants said to him, How long shall this man be a snare to us? Let the men go, that they may serve the Lord their God. Do you not understand that Egypt is ruined? So Moses and Aaron were brought back to Pharaoh, and he said to them, Go, serve the Lord your God, but which ones are to go? Moses said, We will go with our young and our old. We will go with our sons and daughters, with our flocks and herds, for we must hold a feast to the Lord. But he said to them, The Lord be with you if I ever let you and your little ones go. Look, you have some evil purpose in mind. No, go the men among you and serve the Lord for that is what you are asking. And they were driven out from Pharaoh's presence. Then the Lord said to Moses, stretch out your hand over the land of Egypt for the locusts. So they may come upon the land of Egypt and eat every plant in the land, all the hail that, all the hail has left. That the hail has left. So Moses stretched out his staff over the land of Egypt and the Lord brought an east wind upon the land all that day and all that night. When it was morning, the east wind had brought the locusts. The locusts came up over all the land of Egypt and settled on the whole country of Egypt, such a dense swarm of locusts as had never been before nor ever will be again. They covered the face of the whole land so that the land was darkened And they ate all the plants in the land and all the fruit of the trees that the hail had left. Not a green thing remained, neither tree nor plant of the field, through all the land of Egypt. Then Pharaoh hastily called Moses and Aaron and said, I've sinned against the Lord your God and against you. Now therefore, forgive me, please, only this once, and plead with the Lord your God, only to remove this death from me. So he went out from Pharaoh and pleaded with the Lord. And the Lord turned the wind into a very strong west wind, which lifted the locusts and drove them into the Red Sea. Not a single locust was left in all the country of Egypt, but the Lord hardened Pharaoh's heart, and he did not let the people of Israel go. May the Lord bless the hearing of his word. Well, one of the things that I think is driving a lot of fear right now for Christians living in our country, is the issue of, and the question of, and the concern for, our children. Our children. We basically want a safe environment for them, don't we? We basically want a safe environment for them, that they would grow up in a healthy place, and they would have healthy lives, and that they would be successful, and if we could pick out the dream that we have for our children that everything would go well that they would that they would do well and be free from anything that would be harmful to them we never stop and think about though the opportunity in the midst of how things are playing out that we have to train our children in the events that are happening and unfolding in front of us in the things that are happening how they are really golden moments to train them and to be all the more vigorous in training our children and teaching them about the Lord and His power. You see, what we have before us this morning is God revealing another intention of why He's doing what He's doing. We've been looking at that. He's been sort of unfolding some of that for us and explaining that. In the midst of hardship, in the midst of opposition, when it seemed that his people were losing, when it seemed that they had lost, he's telling a story. Think about this. He's telling you a story. The larger story of all the plagues is the story of God's deliverance from death. He's weaving through these plagues the story of the Christian gospel. But why is he doing this in this way? Why is he doing it in this particular way? This is really special this morning. I have to admit, when you say this is my favorite plague, it sounds strange. But this is one of my favorite plagues. The key to understanding it this morning comes in verse 2. That there the Lord said that he is doing all these things so that his people might know the Lord. What an amazing thing. What a wonderful thing. I want my people to know me. I want them to know what I'm like. I want them to understand that. I want them to see that. But not just you. One of the intentions of the plagues here that we have revealed to us is that God wants the little children to know him. God wants his little children to know him. This event was to be one of the plague stories that Israel, it's a summary of all the plagues, that they were to look back upon and say, what a story we have to tell our children. When times are hard, and when it seemed like we were being defeated, and when it seemed like we were losing the battle, God wanted every generation to know this story. He gave us stories. And that the purpose of this morning, this plague was intended to impress upon future generations the importance of telling the story. Challenging us that as we look at the Bible and as we read the Bible, that we would tell this story from generation to generation as the central story of our lives. We come this morning to the eighth plague. um the locust plague and the lord gives us the reasons here right at the beginning if you look there at verse one then the lord said to moses go into pharaoh for i've hardened his heart and the heart of his servants that i may show these signs of mine among them and that you may tell in the hearing of your son there it is and your grandson how i have dealt harshly with the egyptians and And what signs I've done among them that you may know that I am the Lord. I want you to know me. That I'm God. That I'm the Lord. The mighty things that I've done. The power that I've put on display. The power that I have. But it's interesting what he says there. The mighty things that I have done in Egypt, it has the sense, the word has the sense of mocking. it really could be translated that I have made sport of Egypt. I have made sport of the most powerful nation on the face of the earth in a way that nobody had ever seen anything like. Now keep in mind, this was really the most powerful, hands down, nation at the time on the face of the earth. No one touched Egypt. and Pharaoh. That's why Israel was so terrified when they looked back and there came the war chariots. I mean, those are the bombers coming after them. And the Lord says, I've made sport of them. Last week, we look at a few reasons why God did this to the Egyptians. The Lord was declaring that there was no one else like Him in the earth. He wanted everyone to learn, all the nations talking about this, saying, the Lord is God. The Lord is God. There's nobody, No, all the other gods of the nations are idols. And he was doing this to declare, remember, his name throughout all the earth. That's what happened when Rahab, all the nations were talking about him. All the nations had heard about the Lord through this. But I don't know about you. As I read this first section here, I find this, and maybe it's just because it's so fresh with what we're experiencing right now in our own country. This is immensely comforting. Don't miss what Moses deliberately wanted us to think about. God hardens him again. That should be taking on some meaning for us by now. Why is God doing this? To show his power. Why is God hardening? To show his power. We think about the recent Supreme Court ruling, and I'm amazed at how discouraged Christians are and panicked Christians are. You hear people say everything's turning against us and we're losing something. You're losing what? Listen, the tide was radically against Israel and Egypt. And what you just had happen doesn't even, it pales in comparison to what those people were going through in Egypt. Pharaoh was known as God in Egypt. Haven't heard that from our leader yet. He took it. But I want you to notice what God told Moses to say to Pharaoh. He walks right upon into Pharaoh's palace and listen to verse 3. So Moses and Aaron came to Pharaoh and said to him, Thus says the Lord God of the Hebrews, How long will you refuse to humble yourself before me? To which you say, really? God just told us he's hardening him. And now God says, how long are you going to keep on being like this? And how much longer until you humble yourself, Pharaoh? How do you feel when you read that? What do you think the tone of that was? How do you think that went? He's mocking him. This comes as scorn and laughter. This is Psalm 2 playing out. How much longer will you continue to take a stand against the Lord and against His anointed? You see the effect of that? You understand the effect of that? I saw the most offensive imagery the other day. I saw our White House lit up in rainbow colors. The rainbow was God's covenant sign. Commonly to this earth that He would never flood the earth again like that. And so he put a big bow in the sky to say, I'm going to exercise patience and kindness, which Romans 2 tells us is kindness and patience. It has the intention of leading people to repentance. They took the sign. Our leader takes the sign and decorates the White House in it to approve of everything that's contrary to nature in marriage. Now, put this in context. Are you kidding me? How much longer are you going to continue to do these things? How much longer are you going to continue to refuse to humble yourself before the Lord your God? Shouldn't that be our attitude through this? It's almost comical that these little specks of dust are trying to do this. It's almost astonishing, isn't it? No, it's not just that. It's madness. Moses is in there and he's in jest. What are you doing? What are you doing? Much longer, Pharaoh. I think this is the most exciting time to study Exodus. This morning we get to the larger reason for why the Lord is making sport of them and it's so special. I find this to be just special. verse 2 comes out i've hardened his heart that i may show these signs of mine that you may tell in the hearing of your sons and your grandchildren your grandsons the things that i did in egypt you ever think that things have to go this way you ever think that what's happening must go this way he's ready to rumble he's ready to come in majesty and judgment and deliver and what a scene that's going to be my signs that I've done among you that you may know when you see all this unfold when you see me make sport of this nation you're going to know and your children are going to know I am the Lord what a revelation of the purpose of the plagues god wanted people to know him when the opposition is all the stronger and he hits you see that power shine you see that power radiate you see him for who he is but i can't get away from this i'm doing this to provide a story for you to tell your sons and your grandsons. What a God we have. He gave us stories. He gave you stories. You know children love stories. Moses, I want you to be constantly about telling the children of Israel. I want you to gather them around and I want you to tell stories. I want you to tell them this great story so that they understand me and they understand my love. Tell them the story of their deliverance. Tell them the story of their salvation. That they might know me. So the Lord is telling us specifically in this particular plague that He gave all these stories in the Bible that we might tell our children the central story of His salvation. Of Christ. Children love this. I don't know how many times my daughters come up to me and my children say, Daddy, tell me a story. Tell me a story. Tell me a story. It's like it's wired in them. What a story you have. Let me tell you about this proud, evil man. You know what he wanted to do to you, children? He wanted to hurt you. He was a boogeyman. And he hurt some of our relatives. He hurt some of our children. He threw some of them in the water. And you know He wanted to do that to you too. Do you know what the Lord did for you? Do you know how much He loved you, dear children? He did something just awesome for you. He opened up heaven. He hit their water. He sent those, you know those frogs you like to play with? He swarmed them. He sent locusts down. He threw down the greatest storm, shooting cosmic bullets out of the sky. See, that's an exciting story. He sent them all into the Red Sea for you. All of these stories answer the questions of life. Children have questions. Why are we here? Who made us? Why this? Why that? Why, why, why? Why, why? Where did we come from? Why did this happen? Where are we going? Who is God? Why do people act like that? Why do people do these things? Can you imagine how our children will face the future and the coming struggles that are in front of them? Stuff that your generations did not know I think will be worse for them. Can you imagine if this story is in their minds and they've embraced it, how they'll handle the future. This is what the Lord wanted. This is what He was doing. This is the first thing He said in Deuteronomy. Remember what He was telling the children of Israel to do constantly? Listen, you need to teach your children diligently. You shall talk of all of my statutes when you sit in your house and when you walk by the way, when you lie down, when you rise up. Bind them as a sign on your hand, and they shall be as frontlets between your eyes. you shall write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates teach them diligently to your children saddest phenomenon in israel's history is when israel got too busy to talk to their children anymore and the knowledge of god died and the prophets were crying out constantly no one knows the lord anymore no one knows the lord anymore that the parents had stopped talking to their children about their faith and about the Lord. And the Lord said, because you've forgotten your God, my people are destroyed for the lack of knowledge. Forget your children. They didn't talk about them. And the reoccurring thing, it's kind of sad that one of my experiences as a pastor is that you have generations that feared the Lord and then for some reason the next generation seemed to just grow dull and then by the third generation there was no spiritual life. I've sat and done funerals of people who made it to 100 and by the third generation they had totally checked out from the faith. This was a common occurrence. And the Lord always wanted people to know that one of the great purposes that we're here and one of the great purposes is that Jeremiah said one of the great pursuits is that people would understand me and that they would know me, that I am the Lord. But what do I want them to know about me? I'm not a tyrant. I want them to know that I exercise loving kindness. I want them to understand that about me. That's why we study the Bible the way that we do. That's why we preach through books. God gave us stories. Here you're learning His character. Here you're learning Him. Here you're seeing His power. Do you speak about Him? Do we tell? Notice that it was for the grandparents to do this too. I also heard numerous times in my time as a pastor this terrible statement. Well, you know, our grandparents never talked about their faith. They internalized it. Huh? I don't know what that is. We talk about it. This is the design. Do we sit at the table with our children? Have we made that one of the top priorities in the home? Children, I have an assignment for you. You go ask your parents to tell you a story tonight. They've got a lot to tell. J.A. Alexander in his excellent book on the family says, the daily reading of God's Word by parents before his children is one of the most powerful agencies of Christian life. We're prone to undervalue it, he says. He says between families that this instruction goes on and in families where the Bible is not read, The contrast is striking. I believe that's true. To deny such a source of influence to the youthful mind is an injustice, he says. When a father leads this way, he says, a child is forced to say, how can I offend against a father who daily wrestles with God on my behalf? God is so concerned about this. I guess I'm taken by how concerned God is about this in the middle of a plague that he would want to put this down. well Moses so what happens Moses says if you refuse to let my people go I'm bringing on the locusts they shall fill your houses the houses of all your servants and the houses of all the Egyptians which neither your fathers nor your father's fathers have seen since the day that they were on the earth to this day now picture this Moses says it he turns around and he bolts out from pharaoh this is what's going to happen at this point pharaoh's servants begin to panic what are you doing listen this guy how much longer are you going to let him be a snare to us let the men go that they may serve the lord their god don't you know egypt's destroyed can't you look around at your country and see that the whole thing is unraveling at the seams can't you see it Dear leader, you wonder why worldly rulers don't wake up and say, hmm, everything seems to be falling apart. Everything's in shambles. Pharaoh, our water's been attacked. We have no water. Pharaoh, our crops are all gone. Pharaoh, the storm has hit us and wiped out Egypt. Don't you see? Wake up, man! Wake up! Well, now they're brought back in, aren't they? Moses and Aaron are brought back in. And he said to them, go serve the Lord your God. Who are the ones that are going? Pharaoh says, so who do you think is going? Moses says, we will go with our young and our old, with our sons and our daughters, with our flocks and our herds. We must hold a feast to the Lord. He said to them, the Lord had better be with you when I let you and your little ones go, if I do. Notice that there in verse 10. The Lord be with you if ever I let you and your little ones go. You have some evil purpose in mind. Go, the men. Go ahead. Translate. The children stay. See it? See, this whole plague is constructed in such a way as to center on the battle for the children. Not your children, not so. You who are men may go. And they were driven out from Pharaoh's presence. Moses walked out, insulted Pharaoh. They brought him back. Now Pharaoh drives him out. Arrogant. The Lord begins this plague by saying, your children that they may know me. Tell them everything that I've done for them. Tell them the stories of their deliverance, that they would come and have life, and that they would know me. Pharaoh says, they can't go. Do you see it? Do you see the warfare for your children? You see the devil behind this. Oh, if he could stamp out the seed, there's no Christ, by the way, which is probably the greater story here. Wipe them out. What a terrible thought. You guys can go have your good life in Canaan. You can go live it up. Leave your children. Isn't that just an awful thought? You know Satan wants your children? You know Satan has been trying to abduct your children for years and he's good. Oh, he wants your children. and really you don't have a ghost of a chance. You say, well, how do we keep our children? Tell them the story. That's what he's been telling us. Tell them the story. That's what we're doing now. That's why you want to keep your children in church every chance you can. That's why we want to train them well. That's why in the home we want the Bible read. That's the means God uses to keep your children. All of a sudden, God says, go ahead, stretch out the staff. Moses stretches out the staff over Egypt and all night this west wind or this east wind blows day and night. And in the morning, lo and behold, this blackness starts to come over the land. It is something. Let me tell you, it is a marching army of locusts. We have no idea what that must have been like. Because the Lord tells us here, there has been nothing like it in history. You can get some kind of idea of what it was like. But this one was the plague of all plagues. They say that there's no plague on earth worse than the locust plague. I don't know. I can't verify. It's been called nature's most awesome example of collective destructive power. A locust, as the facts go, eats its own weight daily. An arrival of a locust, a plague, would leave them in famine for years. A mile, let's just give one mile of a locust swarm has 100 to 200 million locusts. They've documented in the world's record swarms covering over 400 square miles. In the 1930s, swarms of locusts wiped out hundreds of square miles in Africa. Some said even double the size of the U.S. Is that possible? I don't know. I didn't add. Madagascar is dealing with them right now. A hundred swarms right now in Madagascar. 500 billion locusts. They eat 100,000 tons of vegetation a day. The worst one hit over here in 1988, and this is how the Chicago Tribune described it. Billions of locusts are moving across North Africa in the worst plagues since 1954, blotting out the sun and settling on the land like a black ravenous carpet to strip it clean of vegetation. One of you handed me Laura Ingalls Wilder's story here. It's just fascinating. A cloud was over the sun. It was not like any cloud they had ever seen before. It was a cloud of something like snowflakes, but they were larger than snowflakes and thin and glittering. Light shone through each flickering particle. There was no wind. The grasses were still and the hot air did not stir, but the edge of the cloud came on across the sky faster than wind. The hair stood up on Jack's neck. All at once, he made a frightful sound up at that cloud, a growl and a whine. Plunk, something hit Laura's head and fell to the ground. She looked down and saw the largest grasshopper she had ever seen. Then huge brown grasshoppers were hitting the ground all around her, hitting her head and hitting her face and her arms. They came thundering down like hail. The cloud was hailing grasshoppers. The cloud was grasshoppers. Their bodies hid the sun and made darkness. Their thin, large wings gleamed and glittered. The rasping, whirling of their wings filled the whole air and they hit the ground in the house with the noise of a hailstorm. Laura tried to beat them off. Their claws clung to her skin and her dress. They looked at her with bulging eyes, turning their heads this way and that. Mary ran screaming into the house. Grasshoppers covered the ground. There was not one bare bit to step on. Laura had to step on grasshoppers and they smashed, squirming and slimy under her feet. Ma was stammering. The windows shut all around the house. Pa came and stood just inside the front door looking out. Their long wings were folded. Their strong legs took them hopping everywhere. The air, word, and the roof went on sounding like a roof in a hailstorm. Then Laura heard another sound, one big sound made of tiny nips and snips and gnawings. The wheat, Paul shouted. He dashed out back door and ran toward the wheat field. The grasshoppers were eating. You could not hear one grasshopper eat unless you listened very carefully while you held him and fed him grass. Millions and millions of grasshoppers were eating now. you could hear millions of jaws biting and chewing. Never in the history of the world had there been a plague like this. Verse 15 says the land went dark. Moses stretched out his hand. They went up over the land. They rested on the territory. It says this was very severe. They covered the face of the earth. The land was black. They ate every herb of the land. No fruit trees were left. Anything that the hail had left. There remained nothing green on the trees or plants throughout all the land of Egypt. That must have been something. Keep in mind, just a few weeks ago, they were hit by hail. Their bodies are recovering from boils. Their livestock are destroyed. Fly bites are still probably healing. the stink of the disease from the frogs. All these plagues were directly hit at some god of Egypt. The whole land was black with them. It was systematic destruction of Egypt. Reversal of creation. If you want God's description of it today, I invite you to go back in your afternoon devotions and read Joel 2. Let me just give it quickly. This is a description of the locust plague. Blow the trumpet in Zion. Sound the alarm on my holy hill. Let all who live in the land tremble for the day of the Lord is coming. It's close at hand, a day of darkness and gloom, a day of clouds and blackness. Like dawn spreading across the mountains, a large and mighty army comes. Such as never was in ancient times nor ever will be in the ages to come. It borrowed that from the Exodus. Before them fire devours, Behind them a flame blazes. Before them, the land is like the Garden of Eden. Behind them a desert waste. Nothing escapes them. They have the appearance of horses. They gallop along like a cavalry. With a noise like that of chariots, they leap over the mountaintops. Like a crackling fire consuming stubble. Like a mighty army drawn up for battle. At the sight of them, nations are in anguish. Every face turns pale. They charge like warriors. They scale walls like soldiers. They all march in line, not swerving from their course. They do not jostle each other. Each marches straight ahead. They plunge through defenses without breaking ranks. They rush upon the city. They run along the wall. They climb into houses. Like thieves, they enter through the windows. Before them, the earth shakes. The heavens tremble. The sun and the moon are darkened. The stars no longer shine. The Lord thunders at the head of His army. His forces. are beyond number and mighty is the army that obeys His command. There's the Lord and billions of locusts are His army behind Him. And what an image. That's how determined the Lord is to save you and your children. Think about it. That's how determined the Lord is to save you and your children. In some ways, this plague of so many locusts is a direct response to the Pharaoh holding the children who belong to the Lord, right? And it's like little children coming upon him. Our children are given as a blessing from the Lord to us. But they're not ours. Well, we idolize them today. We live in the cult of the child. It goes on here. We idolize our children. I have a question. Do you have the same passion for your children as the Lord does for your children in what's most important? You want them to have a successful life and good things, to live well, to be comfortable, to be pain-free, to be health, their health going well. And they can have everything that you dream about to have a good life here in the United States? Or do you wake up in the morning and you say, Lord, I know I'm a failure as a parent. I've wanted at times all the wrong things for my kids. But I'm asking you to give me wisdom, to train them, because I want nothing more than for my children to know you and to love you and to fear you. The Lord says, if you love my children, tell them my stories. How does this end? Pharaoh calls for Moses. I've sinned. Yeah, we believe that. Please forgive my sin. Interesting, though, that the issue of sin keeps coming up in the plagues, doesn't it? He's starting to get it. Moses has already told us he doesn't mean it. The Lord brings relief. This west wind comes. And get this. all of them are sent into the Red Sea right in front of him. Preview of coming attractions. That's where he's going. He and his army. He just got the visual before it even happened. Comforting, isn't it? For us, for his people, you're going to be delivered no matter what they do to you. The Lord is clear. How dare you touch my children? I want to close with this thought this morning. When I come to the Gospels and I think of Christ, I'm amazed at how much attention He gives to children. I think of the imagery of Him taking a child and setting him in the midst of them. And when He was taken into His arms, He said, this child was taken into Christ's arms, He said to everyone standing there, whoever receives one of these little children in my name receives me. Oh, He loves it. And I believe that's just what it is when you take children as the family of God. Receive them, care for them, pray for them, love them. I can't help but hear Christ when people try to keep them away. Let them come. Don't forbid them, for of such is the kingdom. The covenant of grace, the first thing God told Abraham, you include the children. That's why I want my baptism. That's why I want baptism on them. That's why I wanted circumcision on them. I'm not casting them out. It's an insult to keep them out of the covenant of grace. And we say, oh, I don't know if we should put baptism on children. Really? He's always done it from the beginning. I've raised Him up. I've raised my children. We raise our children because we believe His promises. So much so that Jesus was so serious about this, he said it would be better if anyone makes one of these little ones, little children to stumble who believe in me. It'd be better if somebody took a giant millstone, hung it around his neck, and dropped him out into the middle of the ocean. That's how serious I take it. He loves your children. And if you grew up and had a bad example of a father, you've got a heavenly Father who loves you. You don't have to fear. The Lord is a father to your children. He'll protect them. He'll keep them. He won't leave them as orphans in this crazy world. What a story you have today to tell your children. He brought them out of Egypt too. And he passed them through the sea and baptized them too. God gave his only begotten son, dear children, for you. For you. He desires to give you shelter in this world with all of your frustrations and hardships too. So don't fear what's happening in the world. God is for you and your children. If God is for our children, who can be against them? If He longs for our children and will bring them home, we don't have to fear. The future is His. That should give us confidence today to go tell them the story. Let's pray. Heavenly Father, thank You for encouraging us about our children. We need that. Our priorities have been so wrong with them. And we confess that and are so thankful that You are the ultimate Father to our children. And that You have promised to bring them too. And that comforts us because we look at a world before us that will just bite and devour them and spit them out. But you plagued Egypt and you'll plague the U.S. for our children if it takes it, if it needs it. And we're so thankful for your love that we belong to a kingdom that can never be shaken, with a king on the throne that can never be toppled, who's prepared an eternal inheritance for us that is forever and ever. Thank you for giving the promise to us and to our children. In Jesus' name we pray, amen.