Pastor Matt's Podcasts

Moses and Aaron continued to ask Pharaoh to let God's people go.  However, Pharaoh's belief system wouldn't allow it, Pharaoh himself claimed ownership over the Hebrew slaves.  This became a battle over sovereignty.  Who is sovereign, Pharaoh or God?  The State claims sovereignty over every area of life, but God is a jealous God and will not tolerate anyone or any institution that claims ownership over His people.

As we continue to study the plagues of Egypt, we get an increasing understanding of how God deals with a State that is in control of all aspects of life.  In Egypt, Pharaoh and his agents attempt to control the Hebrew's worship of God.  God deals with those who try to keep His people from worshiping Him.

In the first two plagues, turning the Nile into blood and the plague of the frogs, we begin to get an understanding of God's dealings with nations that reject His authority.  God went after the god of the Nile as well as the god of the frogs, humiliating the Egyptian religion.  However, Pharaoh's heart remained hardened.

In this second part to the child training series, we deal with people having a hard time understanding biblical principles of the family. Unless people embrace it by faith, they change and manipulate scripture in order to fit what they want to do in their family.
We also deal with the structure of the family in this episode. The structure of the family and the support of the church, how they must cooperate and coordinate in the training of the children.

When Moses had to confront Pharaoh, Pharaoh's belief system and social structure would not allow him to grant Moses' request to leave for three days and worship God. In our society today, we see the same thing happen. Christianity is not one faith among many, it is the only faith. A pluralistic society cannot tolerate a faith that has one way to the Father, and that is through the Son. The belief system results in a social structure, in our nation, that structure must be claimed by the Christian faith once again.

In this episode we examine how Moses and Aaron represented God to the Egyptians. They did not take on Pharaoh, or the gods of Egypt; rather Moses and Aaron obeyed God's command and did exactly what they were supposed to do and God then performed the miracles.
We are God's representatives here on earth, our task is to obey in every area of life, then we rely on God to perform the miracles and overcome the gods of this age.

Moses and Aaron were appointed by God to preach the Gospel to Pharaoh as as well as the children of Israel. Everything seemed to be against them, they were rejected by Pharaoh himself, by the children of Israel and they were old, eighty and eighty-three respectively. There was nothing in the natural that would have indicated that they would have succeeded in their task. However, it wasn't about them, God had given them the mission and tools to succeed in their task. We need to see the same thing in our own lives today. With so many things coming against us, we need to stand in our identity in Christ and confront the modern anti-Christian culture. This story is just as relavent today as it was in Moses' day.

This is the first sermon in the series of the Christ Centered Family. When dealing wiht child-training, it isn't enough to teach tips on how to raise a child; rather, child-training requires an entire life-style change. We begin with the four types of parenting, three of based on unbelief while only one is firmly grounded in faith.

In the Recommissioning of Moses and Aaron, God recounted to their genealogy to them both. They were God's choice, God's men to deliver the gospel to the Hebrews and to Pharaoh. There was nothing that they did themselves; rather, it was what God did for them that qualified them for this task. Similarly, our salvation is for a purpose, we can trace our roots as spiritual sons and daughters to father Abraham, through Christ. This is nothing that we ourselves did, rather this is what Christ did for us, in order that we may deliver to gospel message to the lost in our time.

When Pharaoh refused to let the Children of Israel go, he burdened them with more labor (make the same amount of brick without straw). When this happened the people comeplained to Moses, then Moses complained to God. God never addressed any of these complaints. Rather, God reminded Moses of the Covenant, and told Moses to tell Pharoah to let the people go.

When the problems of life come to us for choosing God's way, we tend to focus on ourselves, our hurts, our needs, our desires. When we complain to God about these things, God reminds us of the purpose of the covenant. In other words, God reminds us of the purpose of the pains of life.