Egypt

I haven't been following all that is going on in Egypt like I should be but the past few days I have been catching up on my reading in my one year Bible, (I am almost caught up) and I have been reading about Egypt during a different time in history. Moses and Aaron are there going before the Pharaoh day after day. They meet with Pharaoh asking to go worship God, Pharaoh says no, God sends a plague, Pharaoh has enough of the plague, asks Moses to pray to lift the plague, the plague is lifted and Pharaoh goes back on his word and refuses to let Israel go. Seriously, how many plagues does it take? Evidently it takes at least 10.

Ya know, I always used to think that Pharaoh was an idiot. I mean really, he is messing the God. Even if he didn't believe after a few of those plagues you would think he would at least realize he needed to do something different. But no, he repeated the pattern over and over and over. If I had been in Egypt at that time I would have been ticked at him. It's one thing for his stubbornness to effect him but Pharaoh's stubborn heart had huge effects on everyone. He said no and everyone had to deal with blood, frogs, gnats, flies, livestock dying, boils, hail storm, locusts, darkness and eventually death. Excuse me but I think I would like to take a vote on this issue.

There are two things that really stuck me about these passages of scripture found in Exodus. The first one is, that if you are a leader, (or maybe I should make this more personal) if I am a leader, I had better be sure to know the consequences for my decisions. My decisions not only effect me but they effect those that I am leading. If my heart is not following the Lord, then my decisions are going to lead others away from the Lord and what is right. Pharaoh's choices and decisions had devistating consequences for the people of Egypt. A few verses from Philippians chapter 2 come to mind here.

If you compare Pharaoh's leadership style to that of Jesus' they are pretty much opposite. Every decision Pharaoh made, he was only thinking about himself. When we look at Jesus, every decision He made was for others. He was always laying aside His needs or wants for those of other people. He said to his disciples in Matt. 20:28, "Even as the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve. . ." So seriously, how are you leading, how am I leading. Are we putting others ahead of ourselves or not? And don't be telling me you aren't a leader. We are all leaders. We all have friends and family, how are we leading in those areas?

The second thing that struck me was the idea of "plagues". I wonder how many "plagues" have come into my life because of having a hard heart towards God and not listening to what He is telling me to do. I wonder how many "plagues" we could all avoid if we would just soften our hearts towards God, listen to what He is telling us and do what He says. In my natural self, I tend to be pretty stubborn, but it is something the Lord is helping me with. The best way to have a soft heart towards the Lord and to be able to listen to His words is to spend time with Him in prayer and to be in His Word, the Bible, everyday. I certainly don't need any extra "plagues" in my life and I don't want my decisions and choices to cause others to have to suffer through any plagues.

Guess I had better quit writing and get caught up on the rest of my daily readings!! :0)