Exodus 9 — Thoughts

What Will Your Response to God Reveal About God?

God sent Moses to Pharaoh with a strange message:

“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.”⁠ — Exodus 9:16

So God put Pharaoh in power. And even though Pharaoh would use that power to enslave and oppress God's people, God had a specific reason for doing so: By making Pharaoh king, God revealed that He — not Pharaoh — was God.

Reflecting on the plagues, the parting of the Red Sea, and Pharoah's ultimate defeat, I think it worked.

A similar exchange happened centuries later. Jesus told Pilate, Ceasar's representative in Judea, that the reason He came to the world was to reveal that He — not Ceasar or anyone else — was the Truth:

“You say that I am a king. In fact, the reason I was born and came into the world is to testify to the truth. Everyone on the side of truth listens to me.” — John 18:37

Comparing these two conversations is revealing. In both, God is showing Himself — His power and His Truth — through the way people respond to Him.

Pharaoh wanted to be the god of his own life, to reject God and believe his own truth, and God showed His power by defeating Pharaoh. Jesus — who was God — submitted Himself to God in faith, and God showed His Truth in the salvation that Jesus' death and resurrection brought us.

So which are we? Are we Pharaoh, grasping in vain at power over our lives and our world? Or are we following the example of Jesus, submitting to Him in faith so that His truth will shine out to the world around us?

(Originally written January 26, 2021)