Let My People Go! Exodus 9:13-26

The Israelites, God's people, are enslaved to the Egyptians. They have cried out to God and he has heard their cries. God sends Moses, along with his brother Aaron, to confront the Pharaoh of the Egyptians and demand that he let the Israelites go. The Israelites, however, are very valuable to Egypt as slaves so Pharaoh refuses. God sends ten different plagues over Egypt and the hailstorm is the sixth one. Each time Pharaoh is shaken up a little, but in the end his heart is hardened and he will not yield to God.

It's tempting to think God was mocked in these exchanges, but through it all God was having his way with Pharaoh. God received glory through Pharaoh. Because Pharaoh would not yield to God, God was able to demonstrate his mighty power through the plagues he sent upon Egypt. This is a reminder that we will all bring glory to God one way or another. God will be glorified by showing he is a just, righteous and powerful God, as he showed toward the Egyptians, or He will be glorified by showing his grace mercy and deliverance, as he did with the Israelites.

Exodus 9:13-26
13 Then the LORD said to Moses, "Get up early in the morning, confront Pharaoh and say to him, 'This is what the LORD, the God of the Hebrews, says: Let my people go, so that they may worship me, 14 or this time I will send the full force of my plagues against you and against your officials and your people, so you may know that there is no one like me in all the earth. 15 For by now I could have stretched out my hand and struck you and your people with a plague that would have wiped you off the earth. 16 But I have raised you up [a] for this very purpose, that I might show you my power and that my name might be proclaimed in all the earth. 17 You still set yourself against my people and will not let them go. 18 Therefore, at this time tomorrow I will send the worst hailstorm that has ever fallen on Egypt, from the day it was founded till now. 19 Give an order now to bring your livestock and everything you have in the field to a place of shelter, because the hail will fall on every man and animal that has not been brought in and is still out in the field, and they will die.' "
20 Those officials of Pharaoh who feared the word of the LORD hurried to bring their slaves and their livestock inside. 21 But those who ignored the word of the LORD left their slaves and livestock in the field.

22 Then the LORD said to Moses, "Stretch out your hand toward the sky so that hail will fall all over Egypt—on men and animals and on everything growing in the fields of Egypt." 23 When Moses stretched out his staff toward the sky, the LORD sent thunder and hail, and lightning flashed down to the ground. So the LORD rained hail on the land of Egypt; 24 hail fell and lightning flashed back and forth. It was the worst storm in all the land of Egypt since it had become a nation. 25 Throughout Egypt hail struck everything in the fields—both men and animals; it beat down everything growing in the fields and stripped every tree. 26 The only place it did not hail was the land of Goshen, where the Israelites were.

Questions
1. What do you like in this passage?
2. What is difficult about this passage?
3. What did you learn about God?
4. What is He leading you to do?
5. What part will you take with you and think about today?

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