Prepare your heart for the Sermon by looking through these suggestions that will assist you in making the most of our time together hearing God's Word.

You will find suggestions for thinking more critically through the passage, meditating more intently on the text, and prayerfully seeking wisdom to deepen your understanding of the passage to be preached this Sunday.

Carefully Think

• Read Exodus 1-4 to refresh context for this week's passage.
• Read Exodus 5, focus on the circumstances and responses of all the characters involved.
• Exodus 5:1-9 focuses on Pharaoh's response to Moses and Aaron on their first encounter together? What is Pharaoh's response to Moses? What in these verses shows Pharaoh's response to God and how he views himself?
• Who is the interaction between in 5:10-19? How severe is this treatment of the Israelite slaves? Why is this significant in the handiwork of God to this narrative?
• What was the response of the people to Moses and Aaron in Exodus 4:31? What is the response found in Exodus 5:20-21? Why the drastic shift in such a short amount of time?
• What is Moses response to the situation in Exodus 5:22-23? Who is Moses accusing of not being faithful to complete their end of the covenant? Which covenant is being referenced?

Prayerfully Meditate

• After receiving God's commands to bring the Israelites out of slavery in Egypt, what are the expectations of how that will be accomplished by the Israelites from what we see in the book of Exodus so far? By Moses and Aaron? By God?
• How does God use the suffering of the Israelites in this passage to work on the heart of Pharaoh? How about the hearts of the Israelites? How about Moses?
• Do our responses to God change when we encounter suffering like the Israelites? Why does God use suffering to work in our hearts?
• Thinking of Moses's call by God earlier in the book of Exodus, how would this event make him view that calling? How can we stay faithful to God calling us to do His work?