The Battle of the God and the gods

Matthew LaMaster

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Big Idea

Tension: What does Yahweh prove in the 10 plagues?

Resolution: That not only is he the only God, but that he controls all the universe.

Exegetical Idea: Through the 10 plagues, God proves himself to be the only God in control of all the universe.

Theological Idea: By allowing our idols to fail us, God shows that he is the only God.

Homiletical Idea: When our idols fail us, we should know that God alone is the only God.

Introduction

1. Retelling the Plagues

So what we have is pretty interesting. God here, just as he said, brings down plague after plague on the Egyptians. And there is this repetition of Pharaoh hardening his heart, and God bringing the plague, and Pharaoh asking for release, and then after God relents, then the heart hardens. And this cycle repeats a number of times. ANd each time the cycle repeats, the plagues get fiercer and fiercer until Pharoah’s own first son dies. So to really help us understand this, I want to give a little bit of information that might be really helpful. ANd by the way, if you would like to know more about this, the ancient history encyclopedia online has a lot of really helpful information on teh Egyptian religion.

The Plagues are an attack on Egyptian religion: Now you might be thinking, what in the world is going on here, why is God doing this? Why not something else? Well, we have to understand that these plagues are an attack on Egyptian religion. You see, the Egyptians worshipped thousands and thousands of gods, and with these ten plagues, God proves that they are all bunk. So while teh Egyptians had thousands of “gods” each of these gods was kind of part of one of five groups.

The first group of gods were the “Nile gods.” Now, you can see here, God clearly is attacking the gods of the Nile. Why do you think the Nile turns to blood? Because God is making it bleed. THat’s the image; their gods are bleeding in battle with Yahweh. And so it is with the frogs. The frogs were actually worshipped by teh Egyptians, and when God makes them come up out of the Nile, he is taking them out of their context, sending them into exile. Now, these Nile gods typically represented fertility, success, flourishing, hope, health, sex morality, legacy, memory, safety, security. You see virtually everybody who lived in Egypt would have lived within walking distance of the Nile. So you can see just how life-giving it woudl have been in their minds to see the Nile bleed and the gods they associated with it removed from it. So God’s defeat of them shows that only he possesses these things. Only he possesses commerce, only he possesses flourishing, only he possesses morality. Only he possesses memory. Only he possesses safety.

The second group of gods are the “sky gods”. These were often birds and bugs. Basically anything that flies. And we see that God attacks this second group in the 3rd and 4th plagues by “grounding them.” We see that the dust of the earth becomes the gnats, and that the flies, and a better translation than that is the “swarm.” So God grounds the sky gods. Now, these gods typically represented luck, fortune, harmony, order, control, stability and certainty. By bringing these things down God shows that harmony, order, control, luck, fortune, stability, certainty, all these things are in his hands. That there is no such thing as the “universe” guiding, that God controls all these things.

The third group of gods are the “cow gods.” And the fifth and sixth plagues really attack these gods, first by killing all the livestock of the Egyptians and then by putting boils on both man and beast. Now, these gods typically represented abundance, protection, fertility, joy, contentment, and above all health. So when God afflicts the very things that are supposed to protect the health of teh Egyptians, God shows that he is the only one who controls health.

The fourth group are the gods of chaos. The Egyptian worldview was very cyclical. They thought that the world was made up of this never ending rotation of the good and evil, of peace and chaos. They thought that the chaos necessarily gave way to peace and vice versa just like the flowing of the Nile which waxed and waned throughout the year. So perhaps when the other groups of gods gave way, the Egyptians might have been tempted to think that Yahweh was also a chaos god. But here, Yahweh shows that he is not a chaos god, but he does rule over the chaos. Because he sends down the evil winds, and he sends them to do his bidding. The hail comes down and destroys everything in sight, and then the locusts come and eat everything else that is left. By these plagues, the God of Israel reveals that the dualistic worldview of the pagans was false. There were not some gods of peace and some gods of chaos. There is just one God, who controls both life and death, both peace and security, both abundance and chaos.

Finally, the fifth gods we might just call the “power gods.” And really here, we see a pretty clear attack on the ruling gods of Egypt. First, God turns off the light in Egypt. In fact, the darkness is so thick that the Egyptians could feel it. Now this is the clearest attack of them all, and it is pretyt much exclusively centered on Ra, the supreme god of Egypt. And Ra represented all power, authority, majesty, and glory. Ra was said to be the Creator and Father of mankind, and when God shows that Ra is no God at all, he shows that he alone has power and glory and majesty. Now, there is one plague in this group. It is the plague of the firstborn. Now, this plague of the firstborn attacks two deities. First, it attacks Tauert. And Tauert was the goddess of maternity, who presided over childbirth. She was later a household deity. But it is also an attack on Pharaoh, because Pharaoh is put in his place, he is afflicted just like any other god. He is shown to be nothing, to be pathetic. And here the Egyptians worshipped the family, they worshipped fertility, they worshipped fathers and motehrs and children, and God showed that he alone is worthy of our worship through these plagues.

Now, there are a couple of other interesting things about this. First, did you notice that for the first few plagues Pharaoh’s magicians can in some way replicate the plague? Why does God do plagues they can replicate? The answer is to show their inconsistency. It is to show that they don’t even believe in the gods that they are worshipping. Yet, they cannot replciate all of hte plagues, and they even say, “this is the finger of God!” which shows that they recognize that there is a God that is bigger than even them.

NOtice the difference here between false confession and genuine confession. Pharaoh was more than happy to admit that Yahweh was a greater god than all the Egyptian gods. he didn’t care, not a problem. But he was unwilling to let Yahweh sit on teh throne of his heart. And that is the problem. Because that is where worship really happens. You see, what you worship is not determined as much by the things you say, but it is determined by the position of your heart. You see, Pharaoh was not willing to trust God, he was not willing to believe that God alone was the source of all these things: life, abundance, security, stability, harmony, wealth, luck, ambition, success. Because deep down, like all of us, Pharoah thought that he was the one who could determine all those things. It is not until God shows pharaoh that he is not a god, it is not until God shows Pharaoh that he is as powerless to bring these things about, it is not until GOd puts Pharaoh in his place that he is a broken man. it is not until Pharaoh can bring himself to admit that there is only one God and that he is not it, does it relent.

2. The gods behind the gods

Egypt and America: Now, if you were to pull aside an Egyptian from this time frame, you know what you would find out? Their life style would have sounded remarkably familiar. Because Egypt was uniquely prosperous during this time, many Egyptians enjoyed a middle class life-style, many Egyptians were very health-conscious, many Egyptians had many different amenities, they highly valued family, they argued about politics, they were fiercely patriotic. In other words: they would have fit in very well in middle-class America. And we would have fit in very well in Egypt.

The gods behind the gods: You see, sometimes its the people who think they are the least religious who are teh most religious. And sometimes the things that we do that we think of as just “normal” are deeply religious exercises. You see, the Egyptians didn’t worship their pantheon of gods because they looked at a funny looking statue and they thought it was divine. They worshipped this Pantheon of gods because of what was behind it. that was their real religion: family, comfort, security, stability, success. They were worshipping the gods behind the gods. Now here’s the thing we’re not that different, right? The reality is that just like the Egyptians, we often worship a whole pantheon of gods, and we don’t even know it.

You see, sometimes its the people who think they are the least religious who are teh most religious. And sometimes the things that we do that we think of as just “normal” are deeply religious exercises. You see, the Egyptians didn’t worship their pantheon of gods because they looked at a funny looking statue and they thought it was divine. They worshipped this Pantheon of gods because of what was behind it. that was their reeal religion: family, comfort, security, stability, success. They were worshipping the gods behind the gods.

Safety and stability: One of the things that the Egyptians really highly valued, especially with their sky gods, but not just their sky gods, was the value of stability and certainty. They really liked to feel comfortable. They really liked to feel like they had control over their lives.

So I’d like to ask three questions that I think

Look, the insidious thing about these forms of worship is not that they're evil or sinful; it is that they are unconscious. They are default-settings. They're the kind of worship you just gradually slip into, day after day, getting more and more selective about what you see and how you measure value without ever being fully aware that that's what you're doing. And the world will not discourage you from operating on your default-settings, because the world of men and money and power hums along quite nicely on the fuel of fear and contempt and frustration and craving and the worship of self.

Now here’s the thing we’re not that different, right? The reality is that just like the Egyptians, we often worship a whole pantheon of gods, and we don’t even know it. But

The novellist David Foster Wallace said: “Look, the insidious thing about these forms of worship is… that they are unconscious. They are default-settings. They're the kind of worship you just gradually slip into, day after day, getting more and more selective about what you see and how you measure value without ever being fully aware that that's what you're doing. And the world will not discourage you from operating on your default-settings, because the world of men and money and power hums along quite nicely on the fuel of fear and contempt and frustration and craving and the worship of self.” - David Foster Wallace

Wealth

Love

Power/Control

So how do we find out our god behind the gods? Let me ask you a few diagnostic questions:

Success

What do you retreat to when everything else lets you down and why? So what is it that you retreat you when everything else you know lets you down. College students, what do you do when you get a bad grade on your exam? Do you go play video games? Why? Because you’re still a god there. Do you go hang out with friends? Why? Is it because they won’t reject you? Do you watch a movie? Why? Because at least you can escape into that entertainment. Do you go to study? Why? Because you know you can do better. Those are the things you worship: success, affection, entertainment, your own effort.

What are the things that disproportionately excite or disappoint you? You want to know what the thing is that you really worship? What will make you disproportionately happy or sad? What was your reaction after the last presidential election? Did you lose your mind and go out and question whether or not god was real? Did you suddenly feel like you were walking on clouds? How about when your spouse doesn’t do something you want them to do? What was that? Was it worth it to get that angry over that? So why did you get that angry about that? Because that’s your idol: having a clean house, having sex, saving money, whatever it is, that is your idol.

What are the things that you routinely choose even when you know you shouldn’t? So let me ask you one more diagnostic question. What are the things that you routinely choose even when you know you shouldn’t? You say, I never do that. When was the last time you pulled out your phone? Isn’t that a little compulsive? Isn’t that choosing entertainment over other things. You say, “I know I should go to church, I know I should read my bible, I know I should do this or this, but I’m going to go ahead and choose something else.” You know it is wrong in your head, but in your heart, you desire this other thing so you’re going to ahead and choose that. I know I should go to church, but I’m just not feeling it today. Well what are you feeling? LIke staying home and watching TV? How is that not worshipping your idol of entertainment and comfort. And how is that not in turn worshipping your real God, yourself? How is that not cultivating narcissm that the world is all about you. What you are doing is sacrificing (notice a religious word) something that you know is good so you can feed something you want. What could be more idolatrous than that?

3. Last god standing

Now, here is the point of the 10 plagues. That God wins. In fact, this sermon could also be titled, “Last God standing.” Because God shows the Egyptians that the places they are going to find their luxury, the places they are going to find their health, their comfort, their stability, their morality, their sexuality, their wealth, they are all empty wells.

In fact, God even exposes that they in a way know they are being inconsistent. That these games they play with rituals and observances are really meant to cultivate the one true God they have put on the throne: themselves. That is what Pharaoh represented for the Egyptiasn: I too can be a god. And that is exactly the progression of the plagues: taking down one god after another until we get to the point of teh whole system: PHaraoh himself.

There’s this great story in . The Ark of the Covenant was captured by the Philistines and they bring it to the temple of their god Dagon as a trophy. It was to symbolize that the presence of the Lord was now the servant of the Philistine god. But they all come to the temple the next morning, and dagon had fallen over in front of the ark. So they’re kind of puzzled, so they set the statue back up. But when they come back the next morning, dagon had fallen overagain before the ark of the Lord, and his head had been severed from his body. God will not broach any rivals. The idols must fall.

Don’t you see this in your own life too? That God repeatedly will allow the things that you have trusted in teh most to let you down. Have you said that your children are what really fulfill you? How long do you think it will be before they push you away. Have you spent your life just looking for that relationship, that marriage, that spouse, that person who is going to complete you? I promise, that will dissolve. Have you put your affection on being a successful person? What will happen when you lose your job. Listen, God does not broach any rivals. And sooner or later; the idols will fall.

Now, here’s how you and I need to think about this: how gracious is it of God to show us that our gods are no gods at all? Couldn’t God have just allowed the Egyptians to wallow in their idolatry until judgment day? Couldn’t GOd just have let the Israelites follow the Egyptian gods forever? But God in his grace and in his mercy steps in and says, “listen, this is all a sham. But there is a better way.” Listen, it is not cruel of God to let your idol fail you or even to bring it crashing to the floor, if in the process you turn to him for all your joy, all your comfort, all your security, all your peace, all your abundance, all your hope.

Now here is the hope in all these things. One of the greatest oddities of the book of Exodus is that as teh people of Israel are going out, we will see next week, they are a “great multitude.” Because among them are many other people, including Egyptians, who had seen and believed. And rather than being separated, rather than being excluded, rather than being enslaved, they are accepted not rejected, included not excluded, and freed rather than enslaved. Rather than giving teh Egyptians what they deserved, God welcomes them in and calls them his own.

After worshipping our idols, none of us are worthy to worship him again, right? WE all deserve to be hung as traitors don’t we? What kind of GOd is this? The same God we see in teh New Testament. God in his mercy, sent his son to be crucified in our place, among common thieves. That the general of teh army, was shot so the deserter could go free. That the judge with the gavel, was punished so the prisoner would be released. That the king was crucified so that the traitor would be forgiven. What kind of God would go to such great extent to reveal his great power, his great majesty, his glory, his strenght, his righteousness, his transcendence, his holiness to prove that he is the only GOd, and yet go to such great heights and depths and lengths to give his love to us? Only Jesus would. And why would we not worship him for who he is?.

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