A Great Deliverance
Exodus 12:13
Israel’s bondage in Egypt is really a physical representation of our spiritual bondage in sin. What I would like to do today is look at how alike both experiences really are.
I. Israel’s Bondage in Egypt.
A. The Children of Israel were brought into Egypt by Joseph.
1. They stayed here for about 450 years.
a) For around 200 of these years they fared pretty well.
(1) They were blessed,
(2) They multiplied to around 3 million,
(3) They became educated in the Egyptian culture.
b) After the death of any Pharaohs who knew of Joseph, this came to an end.
(1) There followed 200 years of hardship.
(2) Years of slavery and suffering.
2. The Egyptians were Ungodly people.
a) They could care less about people who served God and tried to do right.
b) They placed taskmasters over the Hebrew people and made them work hard.
(1) They had to make bricks and mortar,
(2) They worked in the fields.
(3) They built cities and pyramids for Pharaoh.
c) He also had them treated severely, harsh and cruel.
d) Their lives were lives of bondage and slavery.
B. God heard their cries for Deliverance.
1. He sent a deliverer named Moses.
2. How does Mosses do it?
a) He goes to Pharaoh 9 times on behalf of God to warn about plagues being sent upon the Egyptians for holding God’s people.
(1) 9 times Moses comes and 9 times pharaoh’s heart is hardened.
(a) Blood (Ex. 7:14–7:25)
(b) Frogs (Ex. 7:25–8:11)
(c) Gnats (Ex. 8:16–8:19)
(d) Wild animals (Ex. 8:20–8:32)
(e) Pestilence (Ex. 9:1–9:7)
(f) Incurable boils (Ex. 9:8–9:12)
(g) Hail (Ex. 9:13–9:35)
(h) Locusts (Ex. 10:1–10:20)
(i) Darkness (Ex. 10:21–10:29)
(2) Pharaoh finally tells Moses to get out and stay out and if he ever came back he would be put to death.
b) When you are serving God and you have done everything that He has told you to do but you are still no better off, don’t give up…
(1) God still had one other plan:
(a) He told Moses to go back one more time and ask permission for His people to go, if Pharaoh refused then the first born in all of Egypt would be destroyed.
(b) And it happened just as Moses said it would.
3. We see that the Hebrew people who did as God told them to do were spared this final punishment.
a) God’s instructions:
(1) Each Family was to take a lamb without a blemish
(a) It was to be a male less than one year old,
(b) They were to fatten it for 14 days,
(c) They were to kill it before the whole assembly,
(d) They were to then take the blood and strike it to the two side door post and the upper door post of their houses,
(e) Then they were to eat the slain lamb in their homes,
(f) Finally they were to remain behind the blood smeared door post until morning.
b) That night, as the Death Angel came over the land, all the first born sons of Egypt were slain.
(1) However, the sons of God’s chosen people who obeyed were protected.
(2) They were delivered by the blood of the slain lamb.
(a) We are told that Pharaoh rose up and called for Moses.
(b) He then gave Moses and the Children of Israel, permission to leave Egypt.
II. Our Bondage in Sin.
A. In the story of creation we see that mankind was sold into slavery by Adam.
1. We are slaves to Satan because we are enslaved to sin by the nature of Adam.
a) The very nature of every one of us is to sin.
(1) Paul said of his slavery to sin before Christ,
(a) “For we know that the law is spiritual; but I am made out of flesh, sold into sin’s power. 15 For I do not understand what I am doing, because I do not practice what I want to do, but I do what I hate. (Romans 7:14-15 ~ HCSB)
(2) Paul - wretched while bound in slavery to sin cried out,
(a) “O wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death? 25 I thank God--through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, with the mind I myself serve the law of God, but with the flesh the law of sin.” (Romans 7:24-25)
2. The way of Transgressors is very hard (Proverbs 13:15).
a) Sin makes it hard for everyone.
(1) Your sin not only affects you but those who are around you also.
B. We are freed from sin by the blood of the Lamb.
1. Scripture is pretty plain about who Jesus was…
a) Isaiah said about him,
(1) He was oppressed and He was afflicted, Yet He opened not His mouth; He was led as a lamb to the slaughter, And as a sheep before its shearers is silent, So He opened not His mouth. (Isaiah 53:7)
b) In Revelations He is presented as “the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world.” (Rev 13:8)
c) John the Baptist called Him, “The Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world!” (John 1:29)
2. It is by the Blood of Jesus that we are delivered from our slavery.
a) He is the ransom for our redemption.
(1) There is no virtue in the blood of the Old Testament sacrifices.
(a) There was no power in that blood to take away sin.
(2) But praise God that there is a fountain filled with blood drawn from Immanuel’s veins and sinners plunged beneath that flood loose all their guilty stains.
(a) Because of the power there.
(b) “There is pow’r, pow’r, wonder-working pow’r In the blood of the Lamb; There is pow’r, pow’r, wonder-working pow’r In the precious blood of the Lamb.”
b) The writer of Hebrews said, “For it is not possible that the blood of bulls and goats could take away sins.” (Hebrews 10:4)
(1) That blood only pointed forward to the blood of Christ which did have the power to take away sins.
(2) “…To Him who loved us and washed us from our sins in His own blood…” (Rev 1:5)
3. Our Only hope is the Blood of Christ.
a) Just as Israel’s hope on that memorial night was the blood of the lamb sprinkled on their doorpost.
(1) Our only hope is the blood of The Lamb of God sprinkled upon our hearts.
(2) The lack of blood brought death to Egypt,
(a) But Israel took refuge behind the blood and because of that they marched triumphantly from the oppression of slavery.
b) The blood of Christ is our refuge from sin.
(1) It is also our protection in the judgment,
(2) Our hope of Heaven
(3) Our confidence for eternal life.
John Newton was nurtured by a devoted Christian mother who dreamed that her only son would become a preacher. But she died when John was a child, and he followed his sea-captain father to a sailor’s life. John didn’t care for the discipline of the Royal Navy: he deserted ship, was flogged, and eventually was discharged.
He then headed for regions where he could “sin freely,” and ended up on the western coast of Africa, working for a slave trader who mistreated him. Newton’s life during that period bore the appearance of a modern Prodigal Son’s: “a wretched looking man toiling in a plantation of lemon trees in the Island of Plaintains—clothes had become rags, no shelter and begging for unhealthy roots to allay his hunger.” After more than a year of such treatment, he managed to escape from the island, in 1747.
The following year his ship was battered by a severe storm. Newton had read The Imitation of Christ, and during the life-threatening voyage he became a Christian. Ironically, Newton then served as captain of a slave ship for six years. He gradually came to abhor slavery and later crusaded against it.
Newton became greatly influenced by George Whitefield and the Wesley Brothers. He married his long-time sweetheart and began studying for the ministry and preaching in whatever vacant building he could procure. Known as the “old converted sea captain,” he attracted large audiences. He was ordained within the Anglican Church, and in 1764 he took a position in Olney.
Newton felt dissatisfied with the hymns of the traditional hymn book. He began writing his own, many autobiographical in nature, including what many believe is the greatest hymn ever written - “Amazing Grace!”
He also befriended poet William Cowper, and they collaborated to produce (at that time) a hymnal of contempary hymns called the Olney Hymns. It became the standard hymnal of evangelical Anglican churches and includes Newton’s hymns “Glorious Things of Thee Are Spoken” and “How Sweet the Name of Jesus Sounds.” It was reprinted in England and America for the next century.
In his old age, it was suggested that Newton retire because of bad health and failing memory. He replied, “My memory is nearly gone, but I remember two things: That I am a great sinner and that Christ is a great Savior!”
Has the blood been sprinkled on your heart? Are you resting comfortably in the Savior? Today could be your liberation day. God has signed your emancipation proclamation on the Cross of Calvary with the Blood of His sweet Lamb. Will you accept His offer?
