Tues.’s Devo - Water to Blood

Read: Exodus 5:22-7:24; Matthew 18:23-19:12; Psalm 23:1-6; Proverbs 5:22-23
Things were not going like Moses thought they would. God had given him a commission and a promise, but the people he had come to rescue were now in more trouble than before he had come. They didn’t want him there.
Moses went to the Lord to tell him what was happening and ask why. God wasn’t discouraged. Everything was going according to his plan. He promised Moses once again that he would deliver his people and by his hand. He told him to tell the people again that he was going to deliver them and make them his people. They couldn’t hear because they were so discouraged and beaten down with bondage.
God sent Moses to Pharaoh to tell him to let the people go. Moses told him that the Israelites wouldn’t even listen to him, what would make him believe that Pharaoh would listen.
God was not deterred. He commanded Aaron and Moses to speak to Pharaoh and they obeyed.
Moses was to do the miracles that God had given him to do. When Pharaoh demanded a miracle, Moses threw down his rod and it became a snake. Pharaoh’s magicians could do the same thing, only Moses’ rod ate theirs to show that God’s power was greater than Pharoah’s. Then Moses stretched that same rod over the Nile and it became blood. Their magicians could do that but Moses’ blood didn’t dissolve. It stayed and killed all their fish and polluted all their drinking water.
The Egyptians worshiped the Nile god Hapy. All of God’s plagues were against the gods of Egypt. God was declaring war against their gods.
In Matthew, Jesus explained what the kingdom of heaven was like. Then he told the story of the man that owed a huge amount to the king. When he asked for mercy the king cancelled his debt. That is the loving kindness of our Father God.
Sadly, the story didn’t end well for that man because he didn’t extend the mercy and forgiveness to his fellow man. His lack of mercy for him canceled the grace and mercy that God wanted to give him. We have to forgive others it we want God to forgive us.
The Pharisees came to Jesus with one of their trick questions. They asked if it was lawful for a man to put his wife away for any reason. Putting away and divorce are two different things. Jesus explained that marriage was a contract between two people. If God brings two people together, then they should not divorce. “Putting away” is divorce without a contract which is not legal in God’s eyes. So, to remarry would be to commit adultery because, they are still married, legally. Legal divorce is recognized in heaven. Another way to break the contract in God’s eyes is marital unfaithfulness which is a sin. It is the consummation of a man and woman that makes them one. Marriage is a picture of the holy joining of us with God. It is not to be taken lightly.
Lord, thank you for the covenant you made with us through your blood. May we remain faithful and true.