Title: Frogs In the Bread-Celebration
Date: 7/1/18
Place: BLCC
Text: Exodus 8
CT: Hear God’s voice and act today!
FAS Sing Majesty
That’s who I celebrate this morning. Jesus Christ is my Lord and my King and he is my Savior and I could go on and on as to whom Jesus is.
At this time of year there are so many things we should honor and celebrate. There are so many people we should lift up. And I do that. I celebrate our great nation and remember and honor all those who have worked to make it strong.
But the main person I want to celebrate this morning is Jesus Christ. These past couple of months has really brought me to a new faith that brings me closer to God and His Son. I have felt his presence in ways that have shaken my core in ways I had never felt before and I have always made Jesus a part of my life.
But when my hematologist came into the office three weeks ago and told me my cancer was already in remission after the first two treatments I was in complete belief that God had me under his control. I still have a lot of treatments to go trough but I am feeling OK about.
So that is why I want us to all celebrate this morning and give God the glory he has shown to me by healing me and allowing me to continue to serve him.
Please give a shout right now of praise to our Lord…….
But the thing is our celebration is not about me. Our celebration must go deeper than just making me better. We have a Lord who is ready to save us each and every one who will follow him.
I want to first bring up a friend of mine who started coming to our church last fall after I did his wife’s funeral. He knew me and came to church. We talked a lot about Jesus and what he needed to do to be with the Lord and follow Him. He was baptized and started coming to church on a very regular basis.
But then my friend became sick. He fought the cancer and tried to hang in there but the cancer was too strong. My friend Avin Hicks had to quit coming to church and I went to him after church and shared my sermons with him. The week before Avin died he had me sing Amazing Grace to him. He said that was his way of celebrating Jesus. The next week I celebrated the assurance of Avin being with God as he left us.
1 Corinthians 2.9-10, However, as it is written:
“What no eye has seen,
what no ear has heard,
and what no human mind has conceived”—
the things God has prepared for those who love him—
these are the things God has revealed to us by his Spirit.
Avin knew where his future was.
2 Corinthians 5.6-8 Therefore we are always confident and know that as long as we are at home in the body we are away from the Lord. For we live by faith, not by sight. We are confident, I say, and would prefer to be away from the body and at home with the Lord.
Our celebration as followers of Christ must surely be a celebration of what Jesus can and does do for us all. Our celebration leads us to follow Jesus and Him alone. In every aspect of our life we get a victory in Jesus.
I. Okay. I will probably step on some toes this morning. I want you to answer a couple of questions before we start. I want you write the answer down. You can put it in a special code or writing that only you can read. But at least write the answer in your mind and on your heart.
Is there anything in your life that God wants you to do that you are not doing?
Is there anything in your life you are doing that God doesn’t want you to do?
Is God pulling on you? Is He talking to you? Did he call you here today to hear His Word? Do you need to forgive someone? Do you need to change something in your life? Do you need to make a commitment? Do you need to be reborn again in baptism?
Think about this as we go though God’s Word together today.
II. Let’s go to the Old Testament this morning. Exodus 8.1-10.
8.1 Then the Lord said to Moses, “Go to Pharaoh and say to him, ‘This is what the Lord says: Let my people go, so that they may worship me.”
This is interesting. Aren’t we as people of faith to stay out politics? But here we have Moses giving the leader of Egypt a message from God. If we stay quiet about what the powers that be are trying to do to silence our faith, are we following God’s Word? Just saying.
In this verse God is asking Pharaoh to do something. God makes it clear there will be consequences if he doesn’t.
8.2-4, If you refuse to let them go, I will send a plague of frogs on your whole country. The Nile will teem with frogs. They will come up into your palace and your bedroom and onto your bed, into the houses of your officials and on your people, and into your ovens and kneading troughs. The frogs will come up on you and your people and all your officials. ’”
Pharaoh obviously refuses to do what God desires so in come the frogs.
8.5-6, Then the Lord said to Moses, “Tell Aaron, ‘Stretch out your hand with your staff over the streams and canals and ponds, and make frogs come up on the land of Egypt. ’”
So Aaron stretched out his hand over the waters of Egypt, and the frogs came up and covered the land.
Can you imagine? There were frogs everywhere. There were frogs under the pillows in the bed. There were frogs jumping out of the ovens when they opened the door. There were frogs in your pockets when you reached to get your keys.
What’s that squishing under your feet as you walk along the shore of the river? What’s that jumping off the roof, into your bathtub and onto your head? FROGS!
Frogs were in the dough being kneaded for bread. Don’t know about you but I don’t believe I would want to try frog bread.
Pharaoh was about to go nuts so he called Moses and Aaron to his court to do something about the frogs. He yelled, If I hear one more ribbet I will explode. So we read what he says to Moses and Aaron.
“Pray to the Lord to take the frogs away from me and my people, and I will let your people go to offer sacrifices to the Lord”
Moses said to Pharaoh, “I leave to you the honor of setting the time for me to pray for you and your officials and your people that you and your houses may be rid of the frogs, except for those that remain in the Nile.”
“Tomorrow,” Pharaoh said.
Tomorrow. Give me one more night with these beautiful frogs.
Pharaoh is stubborn, rebellious, set in his ways, doesn’t like to be told what to do, proud, his heart was cold. He didn’t want to give in.
The frogs came as a direct result of his disobedience to God.
When we sin we are plagued with problems, doubts, fears, disappointments, bitterness, suffering, sickness, heartaches. Frogs of grief, guilt, despair.
Frogs of trouble find us directly and indirectly.
But God loves us. He’s ready. He’s willing to take these frogs out of our lives.
What do we do?
What do we say?
No God. Just give me one more night with the frogs. With my sin.
III. There are three points I want us to get from our text today.
1. We are famous for what we are going to do tomorrow.
We know what needs to be done. We know what God expects of us. We say we will get to it tomorrow. We’ll get to it later. I’ll get baptized later. I’ll get back to church later. I’ll start studying God’s Word later. I’ll get to it tomorrow.
God forgives. God reaches out. He sends people and things to us that invite to come to His son.
1 John 1.9, If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness.
We can be so lost in misery and unhappiness. We are surrounded by frogs. God has sent us His Son to take it all away.
Jesus:
Will forgive.
Will get you through the struggles.
Will lift your burden.
Will restore your broken heart.
Will remove your guilt from your past.
Will give you hope and a reason to live.
Will give you another chance.
Will save your soul.
That’s the good news.
Romans 8.1-4, Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus/, because through Christ Jesus the law of the Spirit who gives life has set you free from the law of sin and death. For what the law was powerless to do because it was weakened by the flesh, God did by sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh to be a sin offering. And so he condemned sin in the flesh, in order that the righteous requirement of the law might be fully met in us, who do not live according to the flesh but according to the Spirit.
That is us when we live for Jesus.
God makes this clear. We know that. We know we are forgiven. We know what we should do to be saved. We know we can have another chance to make it right with God. But we say, “Just give me one more night with this life I am living.
I’ll come tomorrow.”……
When we put Jesus off, we stay enslaved to sin, to Satan, the father of all lies.
We claim Jesus as our Savior, but don’t do today what we know he wants us to do today.
Beg the drunk to give up his drink. What does he say? Give me one more night. Give me one more sip. I’ll quit tomorrow.
Beg the adulterer to give up his or her cheating. What do they say? Give me one more night. One more fling. One more touch. I’ll leave them tomorrow.
Beg the liar to stop lying. What do they say? One more lie. I’m in trouble. The truth will reveal who I really am. I’ll come clean tomorrow.
Let me have one more night with the frogs… that night stretches to be an eternity.
2. Something worse may come in place of those frogs.
Frogs are actually cute. We all loved Kermit. But we sure don’t want frogs everywhere.
Pharaoh changed his heart and hardened it. He didn’t do what God wanted him to do today. In other words he went back on his promise to God.
So more plagues came.
Gnats, flies, boils, locust, darkness, and death of the first born of Egypt.
When we choose to disobey God, there will be consequences. We try to justify our actions. God is not about punishing. He is about guiding us back to a good life for us.
The problem is we don’t realize it until we hit rock bottom. Only then do we turn to God. [Screen 10]
Jeremiah 2.19, Your wickedness will punish you; your backsliding will rebuke you.
Consider then and realize how evil and bitter it is for you when you forsake the Lord your God and have no awe of me,” declares the Lord, the Lord Almighty.
God is not the punisher.
Our sin, our disobedience to God is what is destroying us.
That thing you are keeping from God he wants you to do.
That thing that God wants you to stop doing.
Just know that when we say no to God the problems will just get worse.
Today it may just be frogs.
Tomorrow boils.
Then darkness. Then death.
Stop making excuses. Stop trying to justify your actions or lack of actions.
Just make the commitment to please and honor God in all we do.
3. Two thousand, nine hundred and seventy seven people got up one late summer morning to go work, school, to life. They never returned to their homes. Their lives were cut short by terrorist attacks on our homeland. I am sure they all had plans for September 12, 2001. But that tomorrow never came for them.
Tomorrow may never come. There is no guarantee.
Proverbs 27.1, Do not boast about tomorrow, for you do not know what a day may bring.
Sudden death. Life interrupted. No one is exempt.
Hebrews 3.12 See to it, brothers and sisters, that none of you has a sinful, unbelieving heart that turns away from the living God.
Are we to make sure no one who is a Christian is to have a sinful heart? We hear all the time we are not to judge. That is true. We are not to judge those outside the church. But what about those who become part of the church? The church is the people, not the building. Let’s see what it says.
1 Corinthians 5.12, What business is it of mine to judge those outside the church? Are you not to judge those inside?
We are to hold each other accountable as brothers and sisters in Christ. Tomorrow may not come. So how do we do it?
Lets start again at Hebrews 3.13-15, But encourage one another daily, as long as it is called “Today,” so that none of you may be hardened by sin’s deceitfulness.
We have come to share in Christ, if indeed we hold our original conviction firmly to the very end.
As has just been said:
“Today, if you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts as you did in the rebellion.”
Don’t let your heart be hardened.
Some of you are hearing God speaking to you today.
Some of you are not following Christ with all your heart. A fan, but not a follower.
Some of you are yet to commit to baptism. To do what God says to do.
There are things God wants you to do.
Some of you have things God wants you to change.
Tomorrow may be too late.
So, whatever you wrote down today. Don’t wait till tomorrow.
Today, if God is calling you. Don’t be like Pharaoh. Don’t harden your heart. ACT.
Like a victorious locker room, church is a place to exult, to give thanks, to celebrate the great news that all is forgiven, that God is love, that victory is certain.
Philip Yancey in Leadership, Vol. 8, no. 3.
