Editor’s note: This article is a lightly edited transcript of a Sunday class teaching given on Resurrection Sunday. The session opens with an extended stretch of catch-up banter and ministry-strategy musing before the formal teaching begins. The Scripture reading (Exodus 11:1–10) and opening prayer have been preserved as references rather than reproduced in full. Class member contributions and Q&A — including Tiffany’s question about verses 8–9 in relation to verse 29 — have been preserved with attribution. Spoken cadence (asides, self-corrections) has been preserved deliberately; mid-thought breaks are marked
[interjection]. Section headings have been added by the editor to aid navigation.
Opening Banter (Pre-Teaching)
This is a really good Raiden 1.4.6 — I’ll be very excited if this is top of the line, you know. And then it comes with tools to do it, like a wee screwdriver, a spudger, and a craft knife. It looks a lot better — it’s just because that screen’s backlit here, but you see how it looks.
I know, yes — I’m talking about — I mean, it’s even better than his. Yeah. It’s a matter of seconds or maybe, but when it records to here, through this device, the switcher, it is just so epically good. Phenomenal. But that’s the stuff that has to be learned. Some of the stuff is, but it’s all about the focus, and, you know. But I really like how he brings the text up on the screen. Yeah, it’s very simple, you know.
Okay, well, and then he highlights what part he wants you to see as well. Hello, Christine — it is Nathan and Tiffany in the corner. Hello — that is her arm, but she does not like to be on the video. But she does also want to say hello on the video.
Did you have a good week?
Christine (class member): Pardon? Did you have a good week? Yeah, yeah, it wasn’t too bad at all. Yeah, what about yourselves?
We had a better week. We’re getting settled at long last. I’m so thankful.
Tiffany (class member): Yeah, we worked hard in the laundry room, took everything out and Nathan sprayed bleach all over everything. He got this like a weed killer kind of big enormous squirt thing that has the wand that goes around. And so he just basically attacked the whole laundry room with the bleach, and we just let it that way for days. And we ran the dehumidifier in there and then wiped it all down. Everything’s a bit monkey, slightly monkey, because the house was closed up, you know. 11 years, yeah. So we’re going to do it piece by piece, the same exact thing in the kitchen.
Christine (class member): What did you say about 11 years?
Yeah, it had been shut up for 11 years. Oh, okay. Yeah, so it really is — it has quite a… smell. Yeah. Yeah, it’s somewhat — we’re conquering it. We’re having dominion over it progressively.
Tiffany (class member): Well, it’s been a lot of prayer on, okay, Lord, show us what to do, what to do next, what to do next. And there’s just — it’s just been a lot. That’s been the hardest. Yeah, because we’ll go to church and Nathan will say, is that us? Do we smell like this? You know, because even our clothes, everything smells that way. So, yeah, it’s been…
Yeah, we’re really excited that — we might get COVID. Then we won’t be able to smell it. Everybody will smell us, but we won’t be able to smell it. From where, from — [interjection: aside] He’s just thinking about not smelling, yeah. From — I don’t know. Russian bots. Okay. That’s as good a place as any. Hmm. Oh, dear.
My keyboard is broken and I’ve replaced it with another keyboard, which is also broken, but — Oh, no. It’s only broken in that the H key doesn’t work, which is why my name is spelled wrong. Oh, no. Oh, no. Well, if you hadn’t pointed out, I might not have noticed, but I probably would have. It’s annoying. I’m finding it annoying.
Talking of annoying. Hello. Oh, that’s a bit harsh. I know. That is a bit harsh. How are all of our precious friends? Have you all had a good week? Lovely. Thank you. Good. Good to see you all.
So, you’ve expanded the room. Expanded the room? Expanded. Oh. Oh, I just twisted this around. That’s how I prefer it. There you go. But I was just — I was chatting with Christine, that’s all. So, yep. Good to see you all. Good to see you all. Ah! She’s disappeared. Vanishing. Vanishing. She’s reached vanishing point. There you go. No. Oh, some crack. Some crack.
So, Christine — sorry — was that just a computer problem you were having? Or something else?
Christine (class member): Yeah. I seem to have a problem with keyboards. I go through them at a tremendous rate. And I — my keyboard broke this week, so I couldn’t type with it. Some of the keys would maybe type three or four keys at one time. And I don’t know what went wrong. So, I’ve replaced it temporarily with another keyboard I have. But this keyboard that I’m using has a key missing. Right in the middle. I don’t know if you can see. Here. There’s a key missing here. And it is an H. Which is why my name is spelt wrongly. So, yeah.
It wouldn’t matter in Yorkshire. No, because they don’t use the H. [Laughter] Ew! They’d be going down the road — are you concerned about cutting your nails or something? I’m going to blame the cats. I don’t know what the problem is. That’s my thought. That’s my first thought. Blame the cats.
I’m talking of cats. Is there any news? Cat news? No. It just gets bigger and bigger. Okay. Are they getting bigger? The two of them. They’re both. Yeah. Oh. I think the Conkeys were saying to me that they would like one of them at least. Blame the cats. Before it pops.
Tiffany (class member): We got — we have six. We’re good. We have — we were sitting having lunch today. And all of a sudden, I got the scare of my day. And one of the big ones jumped into the window seal in the dining room area. It scared me to death. I was not expecting that. The cat face just right there in the window seal. Anyway. I jumped. Woo!
So, no. We’re good. We’ve got six. We’ve got plenty. Plenty, plenty. Yeah. We take very good care of them. We’re trying to encourage them to return to nature.
My cat joke of the day was — I went out the front door earlier on. And there was a cat just outside that obviously got a huge fright. So, it blinked for its life and jumped over the wall to escape. Only — we’ve just put a fish tank up on top of the wall. Cats love to swim though. They’re good swimmers, aren’t they? It didn’t land in the tank. It landed splat up against the glass of the tank. It rolls down and tries it another time. Still don’t know what’s happened.
When you delight in the misfortune of a cat, I think it’s called shouting further. That’s a good cat. Oh, dear. Oh, dear.
Well, my mammy’s just out of hospital. So, she is now. Yay! And my brother, Jonathan, he’s over to visit the family. So, for Easter, you know. It was all a big row of Conkeys in Hamilton’s this morning at church. Everybody was thinking the clan is united once again for one last airstrike or something.
Does anybody know what’s been happening in the news? Because I haven’t been following anything. Are we at war with Iran? Have we invaded Russia yet?
Class member: No, not yet. There’s not much change in Ukraine. There’s a lot of rumours about Keir Starmer, though. Oh, yeah? A lot of rumours? Yeah, apparently there’s a video of him circulating with Lord Ali. There does be a related to him taking an AIDS test.
Well, there’s rumours that that is — oh, is he very good friends? Yes, very good friends. And, obviously, Lord Ali’s given him a lot of money in the past. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Class member: Somehow Jim Davidson is involved in it. No, no — what? The comic? Yeah, something like he was the one with the video and he showed it to Keir Starmer’s wife.
I don’t know. The whole thing is very surreal. Bizarre. I don’t really understand it. But, anyway, some people are saying it will bring him down, but — I don’t know. I think somehow he’ll weather it. Oh, it’s just when I barf. Goodness gracious me. There you go.
On lighter news — I’m trying to think of something. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Just about anything is lighter than that. Goodness me.
Well, has anybody got any news? About anything?
Christine (class member): I’m planning to rip up my carpets tomorrow.
Oh, that’s good. It’s just like you hit the carpets all of a sudden? Or what’s the story?
Christine (class member): I think the carpets are the main problem with the fleas and the cats. Right. I can’t get rid of the — I just can’t get rid of the fleas.
Have you seen the bomb that they do? If you look on Amazon for a flea bomb? Yeah, the carpets are horrible anyway. Right, right, right. In the long term, I’d probably like to replace them anyway, so — I think that’s what I’ll do. Are you going to wrap the cats up into the old carpet? No. Well, look, just think outside the box. That’s what we do here. That’s too far outside the box. It’s in a pine box. Now, now.
Beside every Nathan is a Tiffany with her head in her hands. At this moment in time, this is the first time this has happened. On camera. Well, I haven’t seen it before. You’re obviously behind me, not beside me. I’m blushing a beetroot here. It’s me. Hi. Well.
Is there any news from anybody that’s planning to go to Zambia?
Class member (Beyond): We did get one piece of paper this week.
Okay. Was that an illegal you got it from? Or?
Class member (Beyond): It was actually from Mr. Vellum.
Oh. Okay. So that was good. A piece of paper. Huh. Signed by Vellum. Huh. This is very mysterious. You’ve done your job well. Well, I know, I know. I know Vellum. Yes, yes, yes. So was it a Gregory Peck? Well. Well, a Gregory Peck. It’s spelled one way. It’s spelled with a Q in English. It’s spelled with a CK in American. Oh, good. Oh, good. Right. Yes, yes, yes. I thought it was a check. That’s what I was trying to say. I thought maybe. No, no, no, no. You were trying to be mysterious. I was just being confusing.
Hmm. From the Zambians? Or from? Uh-huh. I think positive, though. But. Yes. Well, I did detect — if there hadn’t been 12 bottles of champagne on the table, I would have kind of known. Yeah. Or, yeah. Some of that nice cider. Who knows? Yeah. Yeah. That’s great news, isn’t it?
I mean, they took a ridiculously long time to do it in any case. But it turns out that they actually cleared Joshua’s car seven days earlier than they told him. And they were just trying to wipe his eye for more money. And they were using it in the meantime. Ah. To transport charcoal, as it turns out.
Class member: What’s happening?
So, in other words, they were probably being paid to transport stuff with Joshua’s car for a week. Is it filthy? It had charcoal in the boot, remnants of charcoal in the boot, where they couldn’t get to clean it up because of the way Joshua locked the other stuff into the boot. And there’s charcoal stuck in places in the roof rack, and the roof rack’s scratched up. Hmm. Hmm. Plus, there was nearly 200 miles on the clock. And the tank was empty.
And, yeah, I don’t see anything. But yeah, Josh — in the providence of God — took a photograph of a piece of paper, not realising at the time what he was taking a photograph of. And then found out that it had been cleared seven days earlier. Ugh. Yeah. Well, it’s a salutary lesson, isn’t it? Yeah. But there’ve been a lot of other things around it — lies and deceptions by these people. That was the — yes. It’s not the use of his car per se, it’s that they’re probably doing it en masse the whole time. Yeah, yeah. So they’ve only stopped. Good, good, good. Who’s Percy? Is that the name of his car? I’m sorry. Oh boy, oh boy, oh boy. So, yeah, yeah, yeah.
In related news, Josh has just been test-firing his new 308 today. Okay, a Peugeot 308. Oh, a 308, yes — that’s some kind of a boomstick. A proper one. A proper boomstick — well, good. Well, good. I’m not sure if the agents know about this one yet. They will never hear him coming. They’ll just hear the whistle. Well, quite an adventure for him. He’s having a baptism of Africanness. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Expedition Bible, Myron Golden, and Ministry Strategy
Well, watch the video you sent us there. The guy is — he’s a good guy, isn’t he? He’s a great guy. This Expedition Bible, eh? What? May the Lord bless him.
It just strikes me how the whole world is riven with these lies by truth not told. And it really seems to be that everybody that comes out of a university, including the people, the Bible study people who, you know, dispute the fact — “Oh, it wasn’t 480 years. It was X number of years,” you know — they’re just doing their best. They’re peddling as fast as they can to keep us away from the truth, you know? But it’s so powerful when you have — they’re doing, as the Americans would say, an end run around the gatekeepers, you know? And they’re getting more of an audience than these archaeological magazines or whatever, or journals would ever get, so. Yeah, yeah.
I saw a quote this week — to the effect that the Bible is easier to understand than the church fathers. Something like that. Which I thought was pretty clever. Because there’s a lot of truth in that, isn’t there? Well, absolutely. Not to negate some of the incredible work some of the church fathers did. But we don’t altogether need the church fathers, do we?
Well, this is what I’m finding — that the likes of this Myron Golden chap, you know, is bringing out scriptures that I’ve never, you know, and making a good job of them. Just one guy that was saved in his teens from a life of drinking and immorality and so on. He’s making a better job of a lot of these scriptures than these boys ever did. They were so riven with paganism, it’s just hard to believe. But they’re important, you know, historically. But — and some of these commentaries, they’re just absolutely useless. Yeah. But yeah, well, we don’t want to throw the baby out with a bad father at the same time. But we have to recognise that even the best of them, like Augustine — he had, literally — was it Gnosticism was officially in his background, or some branch of Gnosticism? He was officially in the club. He had the badge and, you know, the card and everything. So, which, you know, carried on.
I think something maybe that you were just saying just now is really important. You know, this chap — his book Where God Came Down is number one in archaeology on Amazon. I’ll tell you the books that all the public are not buying — all of those deeply scientific archaeology books trying to hide what the truth is. Obscure and smear over with doubt. And so absolutely.
And I think we have to — I mean, I’m at the stage of, we’re at the stage of asking ourselves, you know, what my focus should be, what my mission really is. And, you know, one of the things that’s coming up is trying to distinguish myself from — trying to avoid the trap of being somebody who’s always pointing the finger at this person and that person and creating drama. But rather, serving people, you know. And this is what that guy does. He creates an entertaining, engaging, professional video, and then he offers people — he gives — he says, okay, donate, but buy my book. And he has an offering in the marketplace. And I’m realising that.
We’re looking at going through Luke at the moment and trying to make sense of the dynamic that Jesus actually gave people something valuable, something that they wanted, which was healing. And he also spoke to them. And when they needed feeding, he fed them. Yes. These were signs, but no — when it says, you know, the Son of Man came not to be served, but to serve, he actually did serve the people. And I’m thinking, how can I make my ministry one of service?
And this is why I so highly respect this guy, Golden, because he’s serving people in the marketplace. And that goes into a whole lot of other things, but yeah. Yeah. So I’m trying to — we’re trying to understand that dynamic. Because it’s not really economic — it’s very present in the church scene, and at all. You’re not really set up for that. And in fact, it’s probably anti-capitalistic, you know, as, um, yeah. So at any rate, that’s some of the things we’re working through. Yeah. Together. We’re trying to put something out every day. We’re just — we’re having our devotions and we’re recording them, and we’ve started doing a little bit of editing work. And like when I sneezed this week — I had to edit that out, you know. I sneezed great big and he says, bless you. It’s fine. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Anyway. So that’s how the sneeze got picked up.
But that chap, you know, he does have the angle of his experience with his father overseas, and the language, and the archaeology, which is all very, most unique and not replicable — not at least by me at all. But there are plenty of other people playing the YouTube game, learning the lesson, entertaining people, having a hook and the music. And we were looking at the bookcase and saying, ah, he has the red books up at eye level, behind his head. There are the white books, and below that there are the black books. So it’s a black bookcase, so it doesn’t draw too much attention away from him. And just the camera set up on the mic and so on. And the lighting — he has a key light here and a big light there, blah, blah, blah. So yeah, we’re looking to get a focus that will allow us to serve people in the marketplace.
Anyway, anyway, look, you know, that’s the idea.
Calling the Class to Order
All right. Shall we make a wee start then? That was lovely to share. It was lovely to have a wee bit of time together. All right. Alrighty. Alrighty. If Tiffany could poke her head around there — if she wants to make faces at you. Okay. There we go. Tiffany says I can start. No, sorry. Tiffany did not kick me. We’re not doing that. Okay.
All right. So we’re going to need a reader and a prayer, and we’re in Exodus chapter 11 verses 1 to 10. So let’s have a reader first, please. Anybody. Yeah, we’ll just take it down. Nate said he’ll read. Good job. He is a poet and he’s not aware. He is aware. As the little rhyme goes. Jewellery.
[Scripture reading: Exodus 11:1–10 — read by Nate (class member)]
All right, let’s join together in prayer. Let’s pray.
[Opening prayer: Thanksgiving for Resurrection Sunday, for Christ’s total victory over death, hell, and sin; for Christ reigning at the right hand of the Father, as great high priest, as king, as the great prophet who speaks through all scripture; petition for the Holy Spirit to fill the teaching with power, bring insight, encourage, strengthen, give direction and wisdom.]
Amen. Amen. All right.
Confronting the Doomer Mindset
Well, let’s make a start then. And I will actually look at my notes this time. I think that’s the best way.
Okay, so. It is, though, worth considering — with all this talk in the community, the Truther community, Blackpill, they would say the Blackpillers, you know, the people who are doomers and gloomers par excellence — that what we’re facing is a multi-generational demonic, demon-worshipping group, a cabal, highly entrenched interests. And really, they’re almost unbeatable.
Well, he didn’t pull the strings — he just had all the strings. And a nation, an entire nation, dedicated to — they saw all their hope coming through, coming to focus in this person, this stubborn person. Anyway, so I think that’s a point worth making before we start out.
So anytime you’re tempted to think in a doom-and-gloom way — “Wow, these guys really did plan this. And wow, the plan has been going on for so long. And wow.” — we’ll have to just shake ourselves. We take ourselves to this in our minds, open up the scriptures, throw some cold water over our heads and think — goodness me, I was asleep at the wheel there. Goodness me. I have to get a grip of reality. The reality is God just absolutely laid into that nation.
Anyway, and the same could be said, of course, with the book of Daniel. So the heart of the king, be he ever so wicked, is in the hand of the Lord, and he moves it like water courses.
One More Plague — Stacked Upon 80 Years
Now, one more plague and then they would let them go. That’s all. One plague and then they go. But that one more plague was stacked upon 80 years since the beginning of that round of brutal suppression of the children of Israel.
Can you remember from that video, those who have watched it, the name of the Pharaoh that would have suppressed the children?
Class member: Amenhotep II.
Well, yes, that is one of the Pharaohs in the story, but the one before that. I think if you can’t think of it, that’s fine. We just — oh, sorry, go ahead.
Class member: Thutmose II.
Yeah, I think that’s the guy. Yep, yep, yep. Wow. Yep. Okay, okay, okay. So 80 years.
Isn’t it fascinating to be able to look at that guy — I was going to say in the eyes, but — you know, look at his face and couldn’t see the hair, the locks on his head. And Tiffany was pointing out that even in their rebellion against God and trying to cheat death and so on, even in the very act of having themselves embalmed, they are just serving as a witness to the veracity of God’s word. And of course, we saw that Amenhotep II with his pock-marked skin, didn’t we? So he bears witness from the grave to the great truth of the Lord Jesus and his word, and the great truth that you don’t defy God with immunity.
So there was one more plague. But that plague sits on 80 years — two generations — of, “Where is God? What’s he doing?” And it was 40 years since the rejection of Moses by the people of Israel. So dark days, two generations.
The 480-Year Prophecy to Abraham
And of course, there’s a prophecy given to Abraham of 480 years. And you think to yourself — well, why? So in other words, things happen on God’s timetable, but when they happen, why do they happen? All right.
And of course, it was one plague on top of nine other plagues, and generation after generation of compromise by the children of Israel with the gods of Egypt. So they’re on a slippery slope down and down and down in terms of their faithfulness — if they were faithful to begin with, because they were a bit of a rotten lot when they came into the place. So I don’t know, you know, what was the counter trend against that?
Now, the temptation is to look at the 40 years of no leader, no hope; the 80 years of God not intervening after this great slaughter; or the 480 years of captivity — and say to yourself, somewhere in the back of your mind, that things are just going to always be like this. And it is a temptation. We think naturalistically — history just goes on, history goes on. We observe patterns and those patterns really aren’t informed by faith. Some of the times, I’ll just have to say that. And the fact that we all went to state school, apart from those that didn’t, and we were taught this naturalistic view of history, godless view of history — it’s very tempting.
But if you take 480 years — I mean, that takes us back to before even the days of the Cromwell, and the people did the ascendancy of the Enlightenment from the age of 1660 with the restoration of Charles II. And we might think, yes, there were revivals in there, but the work of the Reformation sort of ran out of steam. And we see really an increasing godliness punctuated with, as I say, some revival. But maybe the trend is — it’s always going to be like that.
But no, absolutely not. But naturalistically, you might say, well, where’s the leadership going to come from? Would you see this trend, the trend’s going to continue? But no, we have to say that the Lord has purchased all — he’s asked the Father for all the nations as his inheritance. And so he is jolly well going to work. So by faith, we can use that 480 years of captivity and apply it to our own time and say, well, God can just do whatever he wants to do. But he does it, of course, in his time, in his time. All right.
No matter how entrenched the evil regime is. And of course, we can — people say, well, there’s the Jews or there’s the bankers or pick your group, there’s Illuminati, there’s all these interlocking groups and Mossad and CIA. Okay, big deal, big deal.
God Knows the Prescription
Now, just a few notes there. He knows in advance, always the correct prescription. So think of him as a doctor treating the sin of unbelief in the nation, treating waywardness and treating tyranny. He knows what the cure is. And he uses, like a surgeon uses his instruments, he uses his. And those are outward, discernible actions in history — outward actions, like distress of all kinds, famine, economic hardship. This we see in this story. Work a change in people, work a change in nations.
But he knows the prescription. We might expect one blow and everybody turns back to the Lord. But no, he knows the prescription of how many blows and in what order. And what the culminating capstone event will be.
And we see this nation has been pummeled by bad leaders, pummeled by demographics, pummeled by mass immigration, foolish decisions, wars, trade wars, you name it. Immorality, stupidity, educational disasters and so on. And you think — well, nothing’s really fundamentally moved here. You know, when are things going to move? But it’s like tectonic plates, isn’t it? There’s that force is building up, isn’t it? And only God knows when to strike. But it’s like the snow falling, snow falling. And then the avalanche comes. Maybe that’s the way to put it.
”I Will Bring” — Personalism vs. Marxism
Now, he also says — “I will bring. I will bring.” That’s the key to history. That’s the key to Christian historiography — personalism. Marxism is, well, economic forces, social forces, political forces — really economic forces, I should say, in history. And that’s what moves history. But no, no, no, no, no, no. The key is personalism. God uses means, outward means. But behind those events, disasters, is a personal hand.
And we could say by extension that in our time, God is working in history — in his person — to bring about the desired event. But furthermore, it’s God who brings the tough things. It’s not Satan who brings the tough things and God who brings the good things. I’ve heard that. I don’t know if you noticed that, but that was a sentiment expressed in one of the talks there at that little conference we went to. You know, that was his kind of rule of thumb.
Precision Blows — No Collateral Damage
Okay. So, furthermore — “I will bring… he will let you go.” So not only is he active and working, but God strikes precision bombs — remember, Gulf War I, Gulf War II — to accomplish exactly what he wants to accomplish. There’s no wasted force. There’s no misses. There’s no collateral damage. Everything is precise in its order.
And I think we should maybe meditate upon this and consider the blows that are being applied to our own country. And remember that each plague is a month or more apart. And we get bad news, bad news, bad decision, bad decision, bad decision. So I think we should be thinking and anticipating — well, when is the change going to come? By faith, we’re going to say it’s going to come at some point, and this is how God works. Okay.
All right. Now, as always, jump in if you have a question or comment. Okay.
”He Will Let You Go” — Through Pharaoh, Not Around Him
All right. So “he will let you go thence.” So who is it? It’s Pharaoh is letting you go. And why would he let you go? That’s crazy.
Well, behind any beneficent actions of the power state — why there’s liberty to do this and to do that — you think, why did they allow that? For instance, Klaas Schilder, who was a Dutch theologian, a faithful guy — the Nazis rounded him up very quickly after the Netherlands was taken. And there was some kind of an error. For some reason, he was let go a few weeks afterward. And he was a thorn in the flesh ever since. There’s a whole story there. The church tried to bring suit against him in the synod while he was on the run from the Nazis, which shows you how awful some churches can be. Anyway. Great guy. Great guy.
But God worked in those Nazis to let him go. Literally. Okay. And so as we see — well, why do they allow homeschooling in the US or the UK or whatever? Well, we look behind the actions of the power state to God’s beneficent hand.
Now, “he will let you go hence.” So it’s very tempting, isn’t it, in a time of judgement to assume — or to have it in our hearts somewhere — that we are the target as much as anybody else is the target. And what’s going to happen to the country in general will happen to us. And of course, there will be dislocation, tremendous dislocation. But the liberation that the judgement is going to bring is directed towards the Lord’s people. He’s not going to liberate the Egyptians. They don’t want to be liberated. It’s the furthest thing from their mind.
Liberty Is a Horror to the Unbeliever
It’s a horror to the unbeliever. Liberty is a horror to them. Responsibility is a horror to them. It’s abominable. It’s the Christian who desires liberty. And well, of course, these weren’t necessarily faithful people — I should say, it’s God’s covenant people. Those people that bear his name are the targets of liberation.
It’s also interesting that God doesn’t bypass Pharaohs. I mentioned this before. The ruler of Egypt — evil though he is — will let you go. Despite him being evil, into the occult, being an idolater, and being a total sold-out enemy to God, he will let you go.
Keir Starmer — he’s going to, I don’t know, abolish the income tax. Would you like saying that? He’s going to end council tax or give us sound money. Hardly seems likely. But the point is he used the power that was in the country. He did not go around it. He did not seek revolution.
Respecting Hierarchies — Hating Revolution
This is something worth thinking about. He was Israel’s chosen leader, appointed leader. The people served him, and he worked through him. It shows how God himself respects hierarchies and the structures of powers that be. I think this should give us pause to thought about how we think of our own leaders, as grotesque as they might be — moral lepers, evil men, despicable men.
If God worked through this Pharaoh, and with awful, awful stuff, then maybe we should — even if we have to do it through gritted teeth — consider what God might do, and try to imitate him in this.
That can be contrasted, of course, with when God appoints and gives the land to his people. He says, okay, you wipe that bunch out, you wipe that other bunch out. Let’s get Og, king of Bashan, and make him into chop suey. The children of Israel weren’t given the land. That was not theirs to take. Anyway, so we should hate revolution. The desire to just overthrow the powers that be. And address the civil rulers in matters of civil government. And this goes into the whole — what is it called — the doctrine of the lesser magistrate.
”He Shall Surely Thrust You Out Hence Altogether”
Now, any questions or comments? All right. “He shall surely thrust you out hence altogether.” When the Lord works, he works supremely and completely and totally. The Lord takes this man, he bounces him like a basketball and shoots him into the hoop to do his will. And he engineers this from without — and I’ll probably say this later — but also from within. But not against his nature. He works in terms of his nature. So he gives him extra hard-heartedness on the one hand, and he moves his heart in another time somehow to let him go. Anyway.
Pharaoh Thrust Them Out Without Repentance
But Pharaoh thrust him out without a basic change of mind. Without having been persuaded and said, “Ah, I see your point, Moses. Yes, yeah, yeah. I see your point. Yeah, I accept it. Okay, COVID was a mistake. There shouldn’t have been a lockdown. Yeah, the mRNA spike protein — yes, I can see what you’re saying there. Yes, actually, I’m going to go and get some pine needle tea.” The Lord persuaded. He didn’t have a fundamental change of mind, but God still effected his liberation. He didn’t repent from any of his sin. He did acknowledge sin at one point, but kind of in a sideways way, maybe. So, again — how did the Lord bring forth the action of ejection from Egypt?
All right. Through force majeure. Through sheer power. Sheer, absolute, total, masterful power. People talk about the power state. Well, have I got news for you. It’s the power of God.
So just — boom, bam. And well, all of these nations seem incredibly powerful until God uses what you might call nature, or economics. That’s one thing that always trips people up, isn’t it? Whatever it happens to be. But also combined with a hardening of his godless nature.
The Simple Syllogism of Liberation
And I’m going to lead to a point here. I’m going to drive home a point. And then I’m going to apply this. It’s a very, very simple syllogism. So how did he work liberation? He worked liberation through external bad things happening. Plague, blow after blow after blow. Plague after plague after plague. The word plague means blow — strike with a rod, you know. Combined with a hardening of his godless nature. No repentance. Maybe a little bit towards the end. But he was determinately set on the course of absolutely not, under any circumstances, liberating the children of Israel. And then God worked another little tweak, another big move. And it was totally changed. His tune totally changed. “Get out.”
Now let’s take that to our day. Consider the UK. Are we seeing blow after blow after blow, struck against the Western world generally? Are we seeing a repentance of the leaders, or a continued hardening? Are we seeing people like rulers like Macron saying, “Oh, sorry, overreach, sorry, pardon me”? Are we seeing the European Union say, “Sorry, we made a big mistake here”? No, we’re seeing incredibly foolish hardening of positions and hearts. What is happening in America — I haven’t been following. You know, Trump is doing his own thing. But certainly with your EU, and the UK — it’s just complete intransigence. They’re just stuck. They’re flying the flag for Ukraine still.
So if God used external blows, misfortune, you might say — or trouble in the nation, which had economic ramifications, loss of life, huge loss of life, loss of standing as a nation, the undermining of the central authority, the splitting apart of the expert class against the ruling class — all those things, and the hardening of hearts of those that are really in control — should we not expect to effect a liberation for God’s people? Should we not logically expect by faith that God is doing exactly the same thing in our time?
Would it furthermore not be perverse to look at the pattern of what happened in Exodus and look at our day, and imagine that the hardness of heart and the distresses which the nations are finding themselves in would combine somehow to produce an everlasting tyranny where people would be forced to watch daytime TV without the ability to close their eyes? A fate worse than death. Whatever future you can conjure up — you’re forced to, literally, there’s a neural link connection into your brain, and you’re forced to watch the BBC. Or Teletubbies. Or cooking programmes. And your brain is turned to mush. And then you think, oh yes, I want to watch a movie. I want to watch Netflix. Yeah, that’s great. Whatever it happens to be.
I’m being half facetious. It is a kind of hell, isn’t it, to be stuck like that. Terrible.
God Works by Pattern
All right. So there’s a pattern. God works by pattern. All right. Plenty more to cover.
Resurrection Sunday — The Resurrection Principle
This is Resurrection Sunday. The Resurrection Principle. There’s a Resurrection Principle in Matthew 16:25 — if you try to save your life from God’s commands to you, then you’re going to lose it. All right. Conversely, if you lose your life for the sake of the Kingdom, for the sake of God, you’re going to keep it. All right. Let’s have a look.
This is Resurrection Sunday. Who tried to save what he had in the story? And they ended up with duck egg — goose egg.
Class member: Pharaoh.
Absolutely, that’s right. He tried to keep his stupid, clammy little hands — tried to keep a hold of this great asset. He’s going to control it. He lost it all. Stiff little fingers around it. Lost it all.
Who in the story had to give everything up and ended up with everything?
Class member: The Israelites.
Try again.
Class member: The Israelites.
Try again.
Class member: Moses.
What did he give up?
Class member: His position.
Class member: Pardon me? His position as a prince.
He gave up his position as a prince of Egypt. And he had to give up his position that he went out to exercise his God-given responsibility — to be a prince to the children of Israel. And he was forced to give that up. Two times he lost.
Humility Expressed in the Marketplace
And it’s interesting to consider — “he who humbles himself will be exalted.” That’s another sort of resurrection principle, isn’t it? He who humbles himself will be exalted. And the humility that we see expressed in scripture — this occurred to me — how does it express itself, this humility? Religious exercises? Flagellation? Wearing a hair shirt? No.
It occurs, just on reflection, in actual service in the marketplace, as it were. What did Moses do? He kept sheep in the wilderness. What did Jacob have to do, having lost everything through his insanely murderous brother? He had to give that up and serve in the marketplace. So actually work a job, as the Americans would say, for money, and build up whatever capital, da, da, da, da. So interesting to consider.
Class member: Yeah. That is really interesting because it flies in the face of what I think the church largely thinks about what humility is, which is poverty. That there’s, you know, there’s a righteousness in poverty and there’s an unrighteousness in wealth, you know. Whereas actually that’s not the case. There’s a righteousness in hard work. And for people who are good at what they do, that’s going to take them out of poverty, and in fact perhaps even into wealth. But yeah, the church doesn’t really want to think that, believe that. So it’s very interesting — what you just said there, very interesting. Yeah.
And I’m finding that I think too much of myself — literally think too much of myself — when I think of doing something on YouTube, communicating and so on. And I’m having to wreck my brains to try and think about serving people. And rejig my brain to think — well, what do people want? What do they need? What can I offer? You know. And that’s real work. I find that real work. Anyway.
Abraham, Joseph — The Pattern of Humiliation and Exaltation
So another example, just from previous history and subsequent history of people humbling themselves and being exalted. Hang on a second. I might have lost. Yeah. Yeah. So Abraham and Isaac. Well, yeah — let’s skip over that. It’s a little bit much.
Definitely Joseph. Well, of course, Joseph. Joseph — he had to humble himself. And that humility, again, in Joseph’s case, expressed itself — he expressed himself, expressed itself — in labouring. Even where he couldn’t labour for profit, like in the prison. You would imagine he couldn’t anyway. But he’s actually serving real people in all instances. All right. And he’s not complaining. That’s another important point — that we may find ourselves doing jobs that we don’t like, which are literally beneath us.
I mean, if ever a man did a job that was beneath him, it was Moses — a great man in warfare, a great man in speech. Okay, I think you qualify for being a sheepherder in the backside of the desert. Okay. Bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum.
Speaking to the People — Capitalisation in Precious Metals
Let’s skip over to some interesting bits here. “Speak now into the ears of the people.” So the people — who are the people again? It’s the children of Israel. Speak to them again. God favours his people. All right. And he draws a line between those people who are in the world and those people who bear his name. We know what happened to the children of Israel later on. Yes, but let’s not jump the gun.
“Let every man borrow.” Borrow just means ask for. No controversy, no fuss. “And every woman of her neighbour — jewels of silver and jewels of gold.” Elsewhere it mentions changes of clothing. All right. So what’s the dynamic here? And have we seen it before?
The dynamic is: before permanent departure from a land of captivity and tyranny, where there’s a crafty, wily man, they are to be recompensed in terms of precious metals. So, I should have said that better. So there’s a permanent departure. There’s a capitalisation in terms of precious metals. There’s a tyranny and there’s a wily, crafty, dangerous man.
Does that remind you of anything that we’ve covered?
Class member: Is it Abraham? I can’t remember if that was.
That’s one. That’s one. Abraham, who was capitalised with gold and slaves and so on.
Class member: Jacob.
Jacob. Jacob. Yes. Well, you could say it was more Rachel. But he certainly — that was part of the dynamic.
Class member: But Rachel taking the ephod.
But yes, there was recompense there. There was a wily man involved. That’s right. And of course, Isaac with Abimelech. There was this tyrant who was going to kill him if he knew the truth. He did wrong. And then he was capitalised greatly and sent away. All of them sent away never to return again. Sent away from Egypt. Abraham was sent away from the capital city. Was Isaac. And of course, they never again returned — Jacob and Rachel — and they had never returned to see their father-in-law, or father. So there’s a pattern there.
The Pattern of Justice and Decapitalisation
Let’s observe that pattern. Because if we see the pattern there, we can make more sense of things, can’t we? We can see this is emphatically the way that God operates. It’s not just random. “Oh, I’ll do this and I’ll do that and do another thing.” God’s character is fixed. It doesn’t change. This isn’t me making it up.
So first of all, we can say the Lord is a God of justice. They were done out. Abraham was deeply offended by this murderous, wicked man, Pharaoh, who took his wife. He couldn’t have spoken the truth. He would have been — same with Isaac. Same with Laban. He was a thief. He was a liar. He was a dangerous man. And there had to be recompense.
Now, the silver ephod is a bit funny, but I don’t want to talk about that too much. But certainly in the case of Abraham and Isaac with the two civil rulers, God protects and God recompenses. “You have been greatly offended. Justice has to be done. And justice in this case involves not only being set free from the clutches of these evil men, but also being recompensed.”
And then, furthermore, what’s happening? What’s the dynamic? The wicked are being disinherited. They’re being decapitalised. And God’s people are being capitalised. Capitalised with what? With spiritual feelings? They give nice spiritual feelings. There’s one nice spiritual feeling. Two nice spiritual feelings. Three nice spiritual feelings. That’s altogether 32 nice spiritual feelings. You can spend that any way you like. It’s as good as gold.
Wealth Matters to God
Well, no. God made the world. Jesus had a treasurer. God understands — the Lord Jesus understands — wealth. He knows that wealth is necessary. He knows that money is necessary. If God’s not stupid, we shouldn’t be either. Floating above the ground, never touching down. So wealth matters to God. I mean, we find this before the fall — “Well, there was gold in the lands of Havilah, and that gold was good.” Anyway.
Furthermore, if God has a task, a big move to undergo, he knows that there’s capitalisation needed. Does this ring any bells with anybody? He knows that there’s going to be a substantial amount of money needed to be involved. And he gives that money.
Gold Is as Good as Gold in a Crisis
And furthermore, it isn’t paper money. And furthermore, even in a crisis, in a deep time of crisis, gold held in your possession, held in your hand, in your pocket — it’s as good as gold, always. That’s just a little economic side note. This was as deep a crisis as a nation has ever faced, and gold was still very good. Thank you very much. Silver too.
Okay. And “the Lord gave people favour in the sight of the Egyptians.” So it was a free transfer. Pharaoh wasn’t forced. The hand of Abimelech wasn’t forced. He gave freely. He thought, “The Lord is on this man’s side. I absolutely don’t want to put a foot wrong with this guy. He serves a powerful God. Please take the money,” you know. And he capitalised then by moving the Egyptians’ hearts, as surely as he accomplished his purposes by hardening Pharaoh’s heart — which is interesting, you know.
And, of course, we do have to work for our money. He does not work, shall not eat steak, you know — that’s the Nathan the Conkey version. All right. But we should expect — we should train ourselves and strain ourselves in order to step up and receive freely wealth from the world. How? I think, really, by our labour.
I mean, what a terrible story that was recounted by John Michael there about this import agency. I mean, would you rather deal with a genuinely Christian guy, a Christian firm — you know, not fake ones — you’d be throwing money at that with absolute confidence, rather than looking at these Egyptians, you know, wouldn’t you? And I think that’s how we should — what the dynamic should be. Let’s be a better farmer, a more trustworthy farmer — you know, a more godly mechanic, whatever it happens to be.
Moses Was Very Great — The Exaltation of the Humbled
But it’s interesting — yeah, okay, okay, okay. Moreover, moving on, any questions — just ask the question. All right.
“Moreover, the man Moses was very great in the land of Egypt in the sight of Pharaoh’s servants and in the sight of the people.” So he was very great, even though they did not love him. They did not love his God and they did not follow him. So it’s interesting how God can change the hearts of pagans. They’re still pagans, but okay.
But it’s interesting here — who’s not mentioned in all this? Remember the pyramid. There’s the powers that be, there’s the people, there’s the experts, the Pharaoh’s servants. Who’s not mentioned?
Class member: Pharaoh.
Pharaoh. Pharaoh. He split away from the people. The people — there’s a separation there. Something is not right. In terms of greatness, in the eyes of the people and in the eyes of Pharaoh’s servants — whose place did Moses occupy? I think that the greatness that was formerly given, the sense of greatness, the sense of fear or awe or whatever, that Pharaoh previously had — was occupied by Moses. So it gives you an indication that, in one sense, he was made as well as the Prince of Egypt — pardon me, the Prince of Israel — the Prince of Egypt effectively, although he didn’t lead them, but he was exalted in their eyes in a way which Pharaoh certainly wouldn’t have been. Just something to think about — it’s not a major point.
Again — those who exalt themselves will be humbled, and those who humble themselves will be exalted. Moses humbled himself. He never complained. He was agreeable. He was pleased to dwell where he dwelt. He never complained about the job that he was given. In other words, he trusted God and he humbled himself and he knuckled down and he worked for 40 years. No likes, no followers, no view count. He went away on a donkey. He didn’t have a crowd of camels. He wasn’t capitalised. Never complained.
But look at the meteoric rise — and this is from a place of being exalted in the eyes of all the Egyptians, as a mighty man, as a man of powerful speech. But he took that man who was willing to undergo the humiliation and said, “Okay, God has a plan for me. I’m content, I’m content, I’m content. I’m going to work, I’m going to work, I’m going to work. I’m going to be faithful in my work.” And he exalted himself to be effectively, at least psychologically, where people ascribe greatness to him — of being the Prince of Egypt on the one hand, and he was certainly the Prince of Israel. He had all the elders behind him. He could march the people up and away.
The Price and the Promise of Exaltation
And we shouldn’t seek exaltation as a goal in itself, just as we shouldn’t seek riches as a goal in themselves. But the dynamic is that if we are willing to humble ourselves before God and before man — and it is not easy, and I’m not there yet, I’m seeking to be — God will, it’s a promise, God will exalt you. However small way or great way, it’s a promise. It has to happen.
Now, Moses was exalted, but he was God’s man. He could never just hang about with the boys — “Yeah boys, how’s it going? Drink a beer, friendly, chat, chat.” No, he was very much separated. He was very much on his own. But nevertheless, he had a tremendous level of exaltation. Tremendous, with troubles, yes — but the exaltation was there.
But again, there’s a pattern here. Consider Abraham, when he brought the field for Sarah to be buried in, for the Hittites. How humble he was. He bowed down before them and they say, “You’re a mighty prince among us.” So God had exalted him through his great humility. Even though he was a prince, he was always humble in his dealings. And this was, again, a dealing in the marketplace. He was buying and selling property. You can’t get more capitalistic than that. All right.
The Experts Who Feared Moses
But it’s interesting, isn’t it — that the servants of Pharaoh were singled out. It wasn’t just the common people. It was the servants. So who are they? They’re the experts, the civil servants, the university men. They feared him. But like the Gadarenes, the people in the land of the Gadarenes, they feared Jesus — but they did not want him anywhere near them. “Please get out of our country. Please go away. We do not want — please go.” Anyway.
So, you know, what could God do to raise somebody up — well, there’s no end to what God can do to change the hearts of even these university men, these professors, these highly placed civil servants who are so arrogant. God can raise a godly man up who they would respect. Anyway.
But if we do want to be exalted, just bear in mind that the price may be 40 years in the wilderness of humble service in the marketplace doing a job. So are we willing to truly humble ourselves in God-appointed ways? Because if we do that — if we’re willing to humble ourselves in acts of service, in the home, when you’re a child, when you’re older, always serving people, serving people, as I say, in the marketplace, wherever — a wife serving a husband — that’s where the exaltation comes.
All right. And it was great advice that Tim Yarborough gave me when I had this sort of idea that I was going to study all these books and produce some kind of a work and blah blah, I was going to do this, I was going to do that. And he said to me, “Nathan, first of all, it sounds like a crisis of calling. Secondly, who are you serving?” Okay. Lesson learned.
A Cycle of Three Threes — and Then Something Different
Okay. A couple more things. Sorry to keep you so long here. All right.
Last thing. We’re in a cycle of three threes. There were three plagues, three plagues, three plagues. Moses and Aaron appear before Pharaoh at the Nile, and then Moses appears before Pharaoh somewhere else, and then there’s a plague that comes unannounced. But this is different. The tenth is different. It’s outside that cycle.
And it’s different. Why? It’s different because God comes down. God comes down and issues judgement personally.
God Comes Down — Babel, Sodom, Egypt
Do we see that? Have we seen that before? Where have we seen that before?
Class member: Sodom and Gomorrah.
That’s right. God comes down personally. He has dealings with Abraham. And then, yeah, the angels march on. And for later on, that’s interesting because there’s a — is it the Lord or is it the angel? Lord, angel. What’s happening here? Anywhere else?
Class member: Babel.
Babel, babel, babel, babel, babel. Correct. That’s right. So we should see, then, a pattern.
What is the pattern? Well, these are against civilisations or city-states. I mean, the world would be one world system. The Tower of Babel, of course, it should be called the Tower of Babylon. That’s a city. Sodom and Gomorrah — they’re cities. And this is — it’s not a city. It’s an entire country. But they’re all political units, aren’t they? That’s interesting — that God deals with them as political entities. This city, that city. And takes it personally. All right. And perhaps the Flood as well. I can’t remember how that’s worded. But yeah. So, at some point, God takes it personally, it would seem. And he comes down and he judges it in a special way.
The Firstborn as Synecdoche
Okay. So okay. And I haven’t got any more notes, really. But just to say that the firstborn represents the whole race. And we see that dynamic later on when the law is given — and you’re to cut off or else redeem, you’re to kill or else redeem the firstborn of any animal. And you’re to redeem the firstborn child, the firstborn boy as well. And it’s like the tithe. The part represents the whole. And, in particular, it represents the strength of the race. So, Genesis 49:3, where it talks about Reuben, the firstborn, and so on. All right. So, there’s plenty there.
The Encouragement of Patterns
We’ve got a question from Tiffany. But there’s plenty there to be getting along with. Hopefully, we’ll get that recorded tomorrow again. We’re sort of trying to get into a pattern of doing these things. But I think there’s a lot of encouragement that we find in the patterns. It’s not just one event, one event, one event, and God operates in a sort of random way — one time he works this way, then he works another way. There are patterns here. There are things that we can emulate, like this humiliation — humbling ourselves in the marketplace to serve other people. There’s a dynamic of capitalisation. Decapitalisation is a dynamic of judgements affecting the godless in one way and the godly in another. Or the people who bear God’s name in another. And there’s the fact that God’s judgement personally here would mean disaster for the unrepentant Egyptians, and it would mean liberation and joy for the people of God.
Tiffany’s Q&A — Exodus 11:8–9 vs. Verse 29
But Tiffany, you have a question there.
Tiffany (class member): So this is about verses 8 and 9. And then also the last verse in 10, which is verse 29. And how do we make those two work together? And are we to assume that Moses is saying some of this stuff to Pharaoh? I’m a little bit confused. So verse 8 says, “And all these thy servants shall come down unto me, and bow down themselves unto me, saying, Get thee out, and all the people that follow thee, and after that I will go out. And he went out from Pharaoh in a great anger.” And yet I thought — so it almost makes me think, was he talking to Pharaoh at this point? But I thought that the plague before was when he said, Pharaoh said, “You’re not going to see my face again.” And Moses said, “Thou hast spoken well, I will see thy face again no more.” And then we read — it’s almost like he had another dialogue with him. So I’m a little bit confused about that.
I’ve read in commentaries that they get themselves caught in knots by trying to make Moses’ words true. And it becomes a whole involved thing, and they argue over the tense of words and so on. But the fact is that men say things to one another in the heat of the moment, and they turn out not to be true. So the way Rushdoony dealt with it very simply was to say — well, Moses said this and Pharaoh said this. But in fact, they met twice subsequently. So that is a very simple way of resolving that. However, it does read strangely.
There are three parts here, and it looks like the first part of 1 to 10 is a summary of what God had already said. And then it kind of bleeds in to — it’s almost like a dream, where it moves from one thing to the other without being able to discern really who’s talking to whom at what point. But maybe a translation issue.
But certainly the issue of — I think they just spoke in error, because men do that. You know, “You’re not going to see me again.” “Well, actually, you are.” Moses says, “Fine, okay, definitely not.” So then —
Tiffany (class member): Are we to believe that Pharaoh was told before it happened that his firstborn was going to die? Is that what we’re supposed to believe — that he was told before it happened? Is Moses speaking to the people, or is he speaking to Pharaoh?
Right, well — he’s told to speak to the people, he’s told to speak to the people. And then when it says, “But Moses went out in great anger, he went out from Pharaoh in a great anger” — so it’s almost like, was he with him to tell him ahead of time that he was going to be losing his firstborn?
Some suggest that this is an extension of the narrative in the previous chapter. But I don’t see how that works. And there are problems of when the midnight is going to be. But suffice it to say that Moses — Pharaoh was given — I’m not exactly 100% clear on that, and I didn’t really focus on the sweep of the narrative to be fair. But I’m assuming that yes, Pharaoh was told — rightly or wrongly. But there would have to be some kind of a distance between this. It’s all a bit hard to follow, I’ll have to say. I did find that. I don’t have an answer beyond that. I was trying to focus on another, easier thing, perhaps.
Class Member on Starmer and Pharaoh’s Servants
Class member: Can I say something? Oh, absolutely. Just when you were talking about the separation between Pharaoh and the people, and that essentially the people of Egypt were looking more to Moses than to Pharaoh — I can’t help thinking we’ve got a little bit of that here. And that people don’t really, you know, Keir Starmer is a bit of a figure of ridicule. And that people actually look at Donald Trump as somebody with power and authority. I kind of think there’s a bit of a parallel there, maybe.
I think you’re not wrong at all there. Absolutely. I think the common man would rather have dealings with him. But it’s interesting — I just re-read in there and it’s the servants. You see how deep the rift here is. We already have a separation where the experts say, “This is the finger of God. Do you not realise that Egypt is destroyed?” And then he says, “And all these thy servants shall come down onto me.” So he would be addressing Pharaoh at this stage — the servants of Pharaoh. That’s been a theme throughout.
This is verse 8. “Come down to me and bow down themselves unto me” — indicating that he is there recognising his princehood, you know. “Saying, Get thee out, and all the people that follow thee.” So this is a coup, effectively. It would seem. This is a total subversion of Pharaoh’s power. That’s something I didn’t notice, if I’m getting it correct. And he would appear to be saying to Pharaoh’s face that this is going to happen. “Your servants — they’re going to tell me to get out.” Which is a huge undermining of his authority. Huge.
The Army as Separate Power
And maybe all the loyalty that remained to him was in the army. And that’s why he was able to muster the army to go out. Because obviously the army is very often a separate power than just the political power, and the whatever intellectual and priest class. That’s just something worth thinking about. But the dynamic of God’s action was to overthrow Pharaoh — that’s the word that’s used later on in chapter 12, to overthrow Pharaoh. And of course this is half the job done, isn’t it, if they’re bypassing their duly elected — [interjection] a duly, well, pharaoh-ed Pharaoh.
And of course with the army destroyed, this leaves the power in the hands of the servants. And presumably these servants would then take one of the sons, the remaining son, and put him on the throne as some kind of prince regent that they could manipulate rather easily. Which may explain — I don’t know, maybe they got tired of him — why he only reigned for seven years, I don’t know. Maybe I’m trying to imagine too much. But there seems to be that sort of a dynamic happening.
”And Yet We Just Saw His Body Mummified”
Class member: And yet we just saw his body mummified. So somebody still had enough — he still would have, even after his death, had had enough authority to let them mummify him so we could see his body.
So it wasn’t just like he lost all. Right, I think it would have been possible — given the — you’d have to turn yourself inside out as a nation not to give all the pomp and circumstance. And probably the servants would want to preserve their own authority by affording him all the respect that they could, in order to mollify the people, who would perhaps still have some kind of — wouldn’t want to rock the boat of tradition too much. I think that goes against the dynamic of Egyptian society, which puts a very strong emphasis on stability, you know. Interesting.
Closing
Well, that’s what I have for you this evening. That’s good, that’s good, very good. So we’ll be praying for capitalisation — that your neighbours would give you a lot of gold. And changes of raiment. That would be nice, wouldn’t it? I might say, “Get thee out. Get thee out, eh, lad.”
Very much a side comment, perhaps. But I think a great mistake in reading the scriptures is to not realise that they were men like unto us. They didn’t do things for, if I could say, strange reasons or whatever. They were reasons that we would very often understand. So for instance, as an example — you’re saying, well, Pharaoh’s servants would want to keep the whole sort of system going. Otherwise they’d lose their power. But that’s exactly what we would expect to see in our day and age, whether it be under the Zimbabwean system or under the British system. They don’t want it all to collapse or to change, because they actually could lose — it’s too much of a threat to their own positions.
And we really do need to read the scriptures realising that just because things were done a little bit differently to the way we do today, doesn’t mean that these people weren’t real people with the same sort of motivations that we have in our societies today. Obviously all the same economic laws had to come into place whether they liked it or not.
Modernism Blinds the Commentators
I think that’s why the modern commentators are so disabled. They’re so blind. Because they have a modernistic outlook which says that man fundamentally changes in history. And they also have this idea — this modernistic idea of what Karl Barth called Heilsgeschichte — that this is sacred history. So everything is floating above the ground at least three feet if not more, and it never touches down to earthly things.
Whereas if you simply read the Bible with a light that — as you say — people are the same with the same motivations and the same level of intellect and intrigue and ability, perhaps great — of course, even greater than the likes of Jim Davidson or the greats of our day. Keir Starmer, the great figures that we’re faced with. The hero, the wartime hero — what do you call him?
Class member: Zelensky.
Yes. All these imposing figures that seem to tower over us. Like Emmanuel Macron. If we were sitting down, he might tower over. If Tiffany was sitting down, he might tower over Tiffany. Otherwise, not so much. Goodness me. Goodness me.
It’s a real, earthly document, Scripture. Everything is applicable. This modernistic view — which we all kind of have, you know, it’s in the cultural warp and woof — it blinds us and it makes a lie out of Scripture.
The Feeding of the 5,000 — Earthy and Sensible
We were just considering things like the feeding of the 5,000. And just the very fact that it was the first thing Jesus said — “Put them into groups of 50.” Do you think? Yeah, that’s the most sensible thing to do. You’ve got a crowd of 10,000 plus. Let’s begin by rationalising them into these groups. That makes perfect sense.
The disciples come to him and say, “Well, there’s no food. Do you want us to buy food?” That’s a sensible thing to do, isn’t it? They’ve made an inventory of how much food they have. They see the need and they report to Jesus. And then Jesus says to feed them. That’s exactly what they do. It was the disciples who fed them because they had the baskets.
Everything is very, very, very earthy if we’ll but see it. But I think that’s the effort — just to see it in this earthy sense. And to resist the temptation to spiritualise it and say, “Ah, 50. Yes, 50. That’s the year of Jubilee.” Maybe it does have something to do with that. But also it’s a sensible number. It’s a manageable number. That’s an aspect of the Incarnation — that he became man like us.
Any Other Business
Sorry to keep you folks. Thank you for taking the time and effort. Thanks. This was in a book by Steve Chalk on how to study Exodus. No, I’m joking. Oh, dear, dear, dear.
Well, we appreciate catching up a little bit initially there and sharing a bit of fellowship as well. Well, good. I hope you all have a good week. We’ll close in prayer in a wee minute.
Any other business?
Class member: I’m considering selling my car and buying another van. Okay. But there’s a lot of issues that make that a difficult decision. So I’d really appreciate that I would have the wisdom to know what is a sensible thing to do in terms of — I mean, I found a suitable van. It’s a small van, so the front of it is essentially a car, which is very important because I’m doing this voluntary work and I need something that the old lady can get into easily. She wouldn’t be able to get into the camper van. But it’s likely that I would have to — well, depending, it might impact tutoring, which — I don’t know which would be more lucrative. So, yeah, I’d really appreciate prayer about that. Making a wise decision.
Good. All right. Well, does somebody with double X chromosomes in the Bjorn family would like to close for us? Michael’s just gone out here to run off to the loo, so it’s left to one of the boys. Good, good, good. I’m glad to hear that. I’m glad to hear that now.
Closing Prayer
Great. Great. We thank you for Mr. Conkey and ask that you bless his efforts. Would you be with us all and part us with your blessing this evening? In Jesus’ name, Amen.
Amen. Thank you, Nathan, says Nathan.
Sign-Off
All right, God bless, folks. We’ll be in touch during the week, sure. All right. Y’all have a great week. Bye-bye. Bye. Bless you. Bless you. See you soon. Hope to see you soon. We haven’t made arrangements yet, but we’ll try to get something, okay? Yeah. Lovely, lovely. Okay, bye now. Bye-bye, bye-bye.
Tiffany (class member): Oh, I miss those kids. I want to have so much fun with them again. Playing games and stuff. We just have so much fun. Can’t wait to hug them all.
Oh, yes, yes, yes. Oh, yeah. My sweeties. Sure you do. HEREDOC_END