“Preservation through Persecution” (Exodus 1:8-22)

“Preservation through Persecution” (Exodus 1:8–22)

Pastor Cameron Jungels

Eastside Baptist Church

Sunday PM, March 5, 2017

 

Exodus 1:8–22 (NIV)

⁸ Then a new king, to whom Joseph meant nothing, came to power in Egypt. ⁹ “Look,” he said to his people, “the Israelites have become far too numerous for us. ¹⁰ Come, we must deal shrewdly with them or they will become even more numerous and, if war breaks out, will join our enemies, fight against us and leave the country.”

¹¹ So they put slave masters over them to oppress them with forced labor, and they built Pithom and Rameses as store cities for Pharaoh. ¹² But the more they were oppressed, the more they multiplied and spread; so the Egyptians came to dread the Israelites ¹³ and worked them ruthlessly. ¹⁴ They made their lives bitter with harsh labor in brick and mortar and with all kinds of work in the fields; in all their harsh labor the Egyptians worked them ruthlessly.

¹⁵ The king of Egypt said to the Hebrew midwives, whose names were Shiphrah and Puah, ¹⁶ “When you are helping the Hebrew women during childbirth on the delivery stool, if you see that the baby is a boy, kill him; but if it is a girl, let her live.” ¹⁷ The midwives, however, feared God and did not do what the king of Egypt had told them to do; they let the boys live. ¹⁸ Then the king of Egypt summoned the midwives and asked them, “Why have you done this? Why have you let the boys live?”

¹⁹ The midwives answered Pharaoh, “Hebrew women are not like Egyptian women; they are vigorous and give birth before the midwives arrive.”

²⁰ So God was kind to the midwives and the people increased and became even more numerous. ²¹ And because the midwives feared God, he gave them families of their own.

²² Then Pharaoh gave this order to all his people: “Every Hebrew boy that is born you must throw into the Nile, but let every girl live.”

 

• God’s people may face times when our kindness is repaid with ingratitude and jealous hostility (8–10).

 

• God’s people may face times of intense trial and persecution (11, 13–14).

 

• God’s people can be assured of his continued preservation through persecution (12).

 

• God’s people must act wisely and courageously to honor God’s law, even when it defies man’s law (15–19).

 

• God’s people who act faithfully and courageously will receive abundant blessing from the Lord (20–21).

 

• God’s people may face the most intense suffering and persecution just before the Lord comes to their aid to deliver them (22, cf., 13–14).