Pharaoh's Poor Example

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When God is trying to root out and destroy the gods of your heart, do you ever find yourself saying to Him, "Let's make a deal, God"? That is a response that you must be careful not to have. Learn from Pharaoh. It didn't work out so well for him. It won't for you either!

"We must be careful of our response to God's revelation of the gods found in our hearts.  Pharaoh was shown the sin of his idol worship with each of the ten plagues sent by God. [Each plague was specifically chosen by God to prove to Pharaoh that his gods were powerless to overcome the plagues God sent because they did not truly exist.]  Pharaoh responded with a hardened heart toward the God who sent the plagues.  With each plague, Pharaoh's heart was hardened all the more.  But when you look at the biblical account of this story, you can see some other responses as well.  Be careful as you work through your own heart and it idols.  Keep referring back to this list of Pharaoh's deadly mistakes, making sure that you are not responding to the Holy Spirit as Pharaoh did.

1. Pharaoh begged relief from the consequences of trusting in other gods.   God might not remove the natural consequences of our sin and idol worship.  We should beg Him to change us, change our hearts, not the consequences of our sin.
2. Pharaoh made promises that he never intended to keep.  Once the pressure was off, he seemed to forget the promises he had made.  Don't make promises to God that you do no intend to keep.  God is a covenant-keeping God, and He takes vows and promises very seriously. 
3. Pharaoh refused to listen to reason.  When his people pleaded with him not to continue making the God of the Israelites mad, he refused to the advice.  How are you responding to the sins and idol God is revealing to you?  Refusing His counsel to you means that you will likely keep worshiping your idols.
4. Pharaoh tried to bargain his way out to a plague by offering Moses something other than what God told Moses he would receive.  Trying to bargain with God by only partially putting away an idol, or telling God that you will take care of it sometime soon (so you don't have to lay it down today), will lead you deeper into that idolatry and further away from God.
5. Pharaoh had a moment of revelation about God and about his own sinfulness, but he never had a change of heart.  Be careful not to walk away from reading this, having a new revelation or new insight into the god that rule your life, and then forget what the most important result is to be:  Getting your idols out o your heart and into God's hands.  The goal is HEART CHANGE!

God is patient with us, like He was with Pharaoh, but He won't allow us to continue in our sin and the worship of other gods." 

(Excerpt from Chapter 6, The 'gods' of Your Heart, in Spiritual Healing:  The Surrender That Brings Victory)