Listen to Him

Ex 10:7 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 yet understand that Egypt is ruined?”
 
FROM one day to the next, one horrible, stifling plague to the next, God was destroying Egypt. Historians say this beautiful powerful nation had extensive libraries of astronomy, natural science, crop production, architecture and philosophy. But none of this withstood the LORD God’s purpose to redeem Israel – and ultimately to redeem you.
      Proverbs 16:18 Pride goes before destruction, a haughty spirit before a fall. This certainly was true of Pharaoh’s stubborn refusal to submit his rule to God’s rule. His servants were (Proverbs 2:2) turning (their) ear to wisdom
and applying (their) hearts to understanding. They understood who was all powerful.  
      Think of this. The servants implored Pharaoh to listen to Moses! See how Moses was made new in God’s rule. The “old” Moses had gone. The “new” Moses was wholeheartedly serving God (2 Corinthians 5:17). God had taken this shepherd man out of the desert, out of hiding from his crimes to display God’s holiness. He gathered Moses from his isolation to shepherd a nation. In God’s power, Moses became so powerful, even the common people of Pharaoh’s court said, “Listen to him!” Moses truly had access to a relentless power no one could stop.
      Indeed, as you are a Christian, you have access to God’s great power: Romans 1:16 I am not ashamed of the gospel, because it is the power of God for the salvation of everyone who believes: first for the Jew, then for the Gentile. What would happen if today’s struggling and declining today churches would say, “Listen to God’s Word! Do you not yet understand our church is ruined? Do you know those words are the greatest power on earth? Do you know God’s Word is the power to save?”
      But sadly, our hearts and mind are too near Pharaoh’s, too near the world’s unbelief. Day by day, we watch a once effective church displaying God’s wisdom and knowledge slowly – sometimes suddenly – crumble around us. We attempt to use the world’s ways to restore God’s way. We do not grasp we can only contend against satanic power with the LORD God’s power to save the church from destruction.
      I wonder how long it will be before we listen to our LORD God. How long will it be before the world looks to the church and says, “Listen to the Word of God!”
 
LIFE Link: God really is the ultimate power over your life and over his church. Listen to him.