Intermediate Level, Block 4—Egypt to Good Land
Week 33
Moses—Going to Pharaoh (Revised on 5/11/2021)
Point to Emphasize: God does not give up, and we should not let discouragement cause us to give up.
Reference Reading: Exodus 5—11
Memory Verse: …Be strong and take courage; do not be afraid or dismayed. For Jehovah your God is with you wherever you go. (Joshua 1:9)
Story Sample
God wanted Pharaoh to let His people go so they could hold a feast to Him. So God sent Moses and Aaron, his brother, to tell Pharaoh to let His people go. But Pharaoh didn’t feel the same way about this plan. At this point, Pharaoh had put all the men working as slaves to make bricks and build buildings for him. He was not going to let his slaves go. Do you know how he responded? He said, “NO!”
Because Pharaoh would not give in, God had to send plagues. Not one, not two, not five…but ten! One after the other, every one worse than the one before it. First there were three bothering things: blood water, frogs, and lice. Then seven things that caused injuries—to people, to cattle, even to the environment: swarms of flies, pestilence to livestock, boils, hail with fire, locust, complete darkness, and death of the firstborns. [Storyteller, it would be better to expound on only 1 or 2 plagues than to give details on each plague. Choose only from the first 9. Don’t use #10—it will be used next week.]
Plague after plague, it seemed Pharaoh would let the people go, but after each plague was gone, he would say, “No” again. He didn’t know God, and he wasn’t about to let the children of Israel go. If you were Moses, wouldn’t you have been discouraged? Well, Moses did get discouraged.
God was able to use Moses not because he was a perfect person. In fact, Moses got discouraged a few times and didn’t trust in God when things got tough with Pharaoh. Isn’t that just like us? Don’t we sometimes find it hard to believe that things will be okay when things look really bad?
One time I got really sick. So sick that I had to stay in bed and sleep a lot for nearly three weeks and couldn’t do much else. That’s a very long time to be sick. I had to miss out on a lot of fun things to do and fun places to go to. At one point it looked like I was getting better and I started getting encouraged. Then I realized I wasn’t completely well yet and after that I got sick with something else. Things just kept getting worse and worse that I didn’t think I could ever feel like my normal self again. So, I kept getting more and more discouraged. [Storyteller, tell a story of how you didn’t give up or let discouragement cause you to give up.]
This also happened to Moses. He got discouraged and didn’t trust God. He would go to Pharaoh and Pharaoh would say, “No” and make things worse for the children of Israel. Then they would blame Moses. Well, even though Moses was discouraged, he went back to God and talked with God. God told Moses that He would fulfill every promise. He was not only the promising God, He was the fulfilling God—He would do it. God had to teach Moses not to give up. Moses had to learn to trust in God even when things didn’t look good or Pharaoh said “no” yet again. So Moses had to keep going back to Pharaoh again and again…twelve times in total! Until finally, Pharaoh let God’s people go!
On one hand, we can see that Pharaoh was stubborn, and the Bible says he hardened his heart. That meant his heart did not care for what God wanted or for the children of Israel. Therefore God needed to send the plagues. On the other hand we see that Moses trusted that God would deliver His people from Pharaoh. Whenever Moses got discouraged, he would go back to God and would be encouraged again. After a few times of going back to Pharaoh, he knew that God would not give up and that God would win.
Though we can’t do all of the things that Moses did to Pharaoh, there is one thing we can do. We can never give up when we think something is right. Sometimes we want our friends to come to children’s meeting with us and they keep saying, “No.” Don’t let that discourage you! Remember this story of Moses and never give up! Just keep going back again and again to invite them. One day they will come!
Next week, we will see how God won and Pharaoh finally set God’s people free.