Exodus 10:24-26 - Homiletics

Compromise the favourite resort of the worldly-minded, the abomination of the spiritually-minded.

Pharaoh had tried compromise more than once and failed ( Exodus 8:25-28 ; Exodus 10:8-11 ); but he must needs try it again. This marks the tenacity with which the worldly-minded cling to what they think the height of policy, but what is, in reality, a weak and unworthy subterfuge. Pharaoh did not wish to grant any part of the request of Moses; but, if he must yield to some extent, he would save his dignity and his interest, he thought, by yielding less than what was demanded. On four occasions he makes four different offers.

I. THEY MAY WORSHIP GOD WHEREVER THEY PLEASE WITHIN THE LIMITS OF EGYPT ( Exodus 8:25 ). A foolish offer, which, if accepted, would certainly have led to a riot and possibly to a civil war ( Exodus 8:26 ). But Pharaoh had only thought of his own dignity, not of the consequences. So civil rulers frequently ask the Church of Christ to concede this or that for the honour of the State, when the concession would do the State the greatest possible injury. In their short-sightedness they do not see that in striking at the Church they will wound themselves. In their zeal for their own honour, they do not care how much the Church, or even how much the State suffers.

II. THEY MAY WORSHIP GOD IN THE WILDERNESS , ONLY THEY MUST NOT GO VERY FAR AWAY ( Exodus 8:28 ). This offer was an improvement; it did not require a plain violation of the express command of God. But it was insidious. It was made with the view of compelling a return. Pharaoh suspected from the first that the message, "Let my people go," meant "let them go altogether. " This, until stunned by the dread infliction of the last plague, he was fully resolved not to do. He would let them go as a cat lets a mouse go, so far but not further—not out of his reach. So kings will give their people liberty, or the Church liberty, but only within narrow limits—in seeming rather than in reality—to such an extent as will not interfere with their being the real master, and re-asserting their absolute power at their pleasure. Once more Pharaoh was short-sighted. Had his offer been accepted, and had he then attempted to compel a return, he would only have precipitated some such catastrophe as befel his army at the Red Sea.

III. THEY MAY GO THE THREE DAYS ' JOURNEY INTO THE WILDERNESS , ONLY THEY MUST LEAVE THEIR FAMILIES BEHIND ( Exodus 10:8-11 ). The rejection of his first and second offers left Pharaoh no choice but to allow of the Israelites departing beyond his reach. So he devises a compromise, by which he thinks to lure them back. They shall leave their families behind. But God had said, "Let my people go," and children are as essential an element in the composition of a nation as either women or men. This offer was therefore more contrary to the Divine message which he had received than his second one. Worldly-minded men will frequently, while pretending to offer a better compromise, offer a worse; and, both in private and public dealings, it behoves prudent persons to be on their guard, and not imagine that every fresh bid that is made must be an advance. The law of auction does not hold good either in private or in parliamentary bargaining.

IV. THEY MAY GO THE THREE DAYS ' JOURNEY INTO THE WILDERNESS , AND TAKE THEIR FAMILIES , IF THEY WILL ONLY LEAVE THEIR CATTLE BEHIND ( Exodus 10:24 ). This was the most crafty suggestion of all. The cattle had not been mentioned in the Divine message, nor could it be said that they were part of the nation. The king could require the detention of the cattle without infringing the letter of the Divine command. But he secured the return of the nation to Egypt as certainly by this plan as by the retention of the families. A nomadic people could not subsist for many weeks—scarcely for many days, without its flocks and herds. The Israelites would have been starved into surrender. Moses, however, without taking this objection, was able to point out that the terms of the message, rightly weighed with reference to all the circumstances, embraced the cattle, since sacrifice was spoken of, unaccompanied by any limitation. Once more, therefore, he was enabled to decline the compromise suggested as an infraction of the command which he had received, when its terms were rightly understood. Worldly men are continually placing their own construction on the words of God's messages, and saying that this or that should be given up as not plainly contained in them. The example of Moses justifies Christians in scanning narrowly the whole bearing and intention of each message, and insisting on what it implies as much as upon what it expresses. True wisdom will teach them not to be driven to a compromise by worldly men's explanations of the Divine Word. They will study it for themselves, and guide their conduct by their own reading (under God's guidance) of the commands given them. Further, the example of Moses in rejecting all the four offers of Pharaoh, may teach us to suspect, misdoubt, and carefully examine every proposed compromise; the essence of compromise in religion being the surrender of something Divinely ordered or instituted for the sake of some supposed temporal convenience or advantage. It can really never be right to give up the smallest fragment of revealed truth, or to allow the infraction of the least of God's commandments for even the greatest conceivable amount of temporal benefit either to ourselves or others.