Speaker 1: Most of us eat every day, some of us too much,
because yesterday's food is not enough to supply energy for
today's needs. Why then, do some of us expect yesterday's
portion of heavenly manna, the word of God to keep
us through today's challenges. On this program, we are going
to change all of that. Let's experience God's words today
and receive the power we need to live healthy, vibrant lives.
Welcome to your Daily Portion with your host, author speaker
Elle David Harris.
Speaker 2: Good morning, good morning, Good morning. It is Sabbath, July nineteen,
twenty twenty five. Hello, my name is El David Harris.
I am your host, and this is your Daily Portion
where we give you God's Word every single day, and
today is no exception. We are continuing in our Lesson
study series through the Book of Exodus. We're taking the
journey from Egypt into the Promised Land, and I would
say even beyond the actual ultimate par But before we
get into that, I'd like to say welcome to everyone
joining us, especially those joining us for the very first time.
If this is your first time, please go ahead and
type in the chat first time or type a number one.
And of course everybody who's watching or listening around the world.
Just go ahead and congratulate the people for saying yes
to God and coming here, because God is the one
who gave us this assignment to be here, and it's
because we need to have an encounter with Him. And
for those on the radio, just go over to one
of those one of those different platforms at your Daily
Portion dot com and you can come back and put
it in the comments. Put it in the comments and
say this is my first time. In any case, you're welcome.
This is your home now, and we'll see you every
single day because we'll be here by God's grace. Let's
go ahead and pray, and then we will get underway. Father,
we thank you for this Sabbath morning and for the
blessing of being called by your name. Please please help
us to learn the lessons of our forebearers so that
we don't have to repeat their errors. Teach us how
to be faithful like some of our forebearers like Joshua
and Caleb and others. Please make us holy today in
Jesus name. I pray, Amen and Amen again. The caption
for today is the Plagues. The plagues now tomorrow. If
the Lord spaars life under God versus gods. I will
really start showing how God strategically took shots at the
false gods of the Egyptians to introduce himself, to introduce
himself to the Pharaoh and also to the other people
who were not convinced that they had the privilege of
worshiping God. And so the Bible reads here in Exodus
chapter nine, before we go too far Afield, verse thirty five.
So the heart of Pharaoh was hard. Neither would he
let the children of Israel go, as the Lord had
spoken by Moses. So God had given a direct command.
This is the God of heaven, the one who created
all things, the one that has no equal. He will
share his glory with no one else. He is saying
to you, Pharaoh, King of Egypt, you were gonna let
my people go so they can go into the wilderness
and sacrifice to me, so they can worship and not
be bound. And of course we read a couple of
times last week that really the Pharaoh's like, oh, okay,
I see what you're saying, and he increased the burden.
When God's people were scheduled to rest, the pharaoh increased
the burdens so they would not rest. And so now
it's a showdown. Now it's a showdown. But yeah, I
think you know which way this is going. But at
this moment, Pharaoh is digging like he's not feeling it yet,
he's digging in. He's digging in. Okay, And so let's
get to a few lessons here, a few lessons related
to just this passage, right, So we're gonna begin with
the reality that God did not override Pharaoh's free will.
He did not override Pharaoh's free will. You see, so
he hardened his heart. He hardened his heart. He said no, no,
I'm not doing what God says, and his heart got
harder and harder. Every time he made a decision not
to do what God said, his heart got harder. And
God didn't override that. And God's repeated appeals through Moses
gave Pharaoh multiple chances to yield. And so we need
to just run straight to where we are, like, does
God give us opportunities to do what he says? And
sometimes we say no. And the more we say no,
even chemically, the reality is we're wearing away a path
in our minds literally that is storing up data to
resist God until until through the Holy Ghost and some
neurochemicals like gamma, amino buttric acid and some other things. Yes,
this does come into play when we're making decisions. Yes,
until those things come into play, and God gives us
both to will and to do of his good pleasure,
and we take another pathway and begin to do God's
will and wear away another pathway that leads to continued obedience. Yeah,
the heart gets harder. So the more Pharaoh resisted, the
more his heart became fixed in rebellion. By withdrawing the
convicting power of the Holy Ghost, God allowed Pharaoh's choice
to solidify. So that's what it means by God hardening
his heart, he allowed his choice to solidify. The longer
he resisted, the longer he became more rebellious. Okay, and
let me read now from the book Patriarchs and Prophets,
page two hundred and sixty eight to give a little
bit more context. Here, God gave him light, but the
king refused to accept it. Whose fault was that, by
the way, whose fault was that? Was that God's fault
or was it the Pharaoh's fault? Every display of power
made to save him so now we have the intent
of God's heart to save Pharaoh, made to save him,
only confirmed him in his rebellion. The seed of resistance
sown when the first appeal was made, grew into harvest.
So basically, in the end, Pharaoh and his people they
got what they planted. Let me go to the Testimonies
for the Church, Volume five, page one hundred and twenty.
Each refusal hardened the heart more the man, I would add,
or woman who resists the spirit of God once will
do it more readily the second time. And so this
principle applies to all of us, not just Pharaoh. Everybody
who rejects the call of God on our lives, a
call to obedience, a call to take another pathway, a
call to adjust how we think or how we live,
just hardens us. Every time you say this is difficult,
it causes you to continue to think it's difficult. Every
time you say no to God or later, or I'm
not comfortable with that, or I would rather do it
this way, it just hardens us in the reality of
that particular thought. There are so many things I could
say here, but let's just go ahead and make an application.
Make an application, right, So every time the word of
God comes to you, either softens your heart or hardens.
It softens when we receive God's words humbly, in humility.
When we receive God's word in humility, then we are softened,
and we become more pliable, and we become more receptive
to the Holy Ghost by show of hands, by show
of virtual hands, like are you are you desiring to
listen to God more than you were five minutes ago,
ten minutes ago, yesterday? Or the converse, which is which
is hardens when resisted over and over again. Okay, so,
just like Pharaoh, we are tempted. Humans are all tempted
to dig in when we don't like God's terms. The
warning is clear, and I know I use the word warning.
Some people don't like warning. We don't like that word.
But the warning is clear. Don't delay surrender. I said
it to you before that. Delayed obedience is disobedience. Hardened
hearts are not caused by God's cruelty. They are the
result of rejecting the light that God so graciously gives
us repeatedly. Yeah, so we have a decision to make, y'all.
Can I just leave it like that? We have a
decision to make. We have the privilege to say yes, Lord,
Yes to your will and to your way. We have
the privilege of accepting the love of God that he
has toward us, Yes and become his children. Or we
can say, you know what, I don't really want to
be in a relationship with God. I want to do
things my own way. I want to live in rebellion.
Those who live by rebellion will die as a repelt.
Speaker 1: Thanks for joining us listening. Friends, Always remember we cannot
live by bread alone, but by every word that comes
from the mouth of God. This has been your daily
portion with el David Harris. Make it a great day. Yeah,