Pharaoh said, “Who is the Lord, that I should obey him and let Israel go? I do not know the Lord and I will not let Israel go.”

- Exodus 5:2

As we heard yesterday, Pharaoh did not know the Lord. He claimed that he wouldn’t obey the Lord because he didn’t know the Lord. But Pharaoh was about to have a prime opportunity to meet him.

Pharaoh would see over a dozen astounding miracles over the next several chapters of our story. And still he refused to obey the Lord. What are we to make of this?

Time and time again – both in Scripture and in our own life experience – we see people refuse to know the Lord. It’s not that they haven’t had an opportunity. It’s that they’ve chosen to reject that opportunity.

Compare the characters in our story in Exodus.

Moses didn’t know the Lord when we find him working as a shepherd in Midian in Exodus 3. Moses asked “Who should I tell them has sent me?” He responded to God the way we do when someone whose number is not saved in our cell phone decides to send us a text. Who are you? I don’t know you. How did you get this number?

But Moses asked his question in an open-handed, open-hearted way. As a result, he got to know God. And as the fruit of that knowledge of God, Moses began to obey God—imperfectly, as we all do. But Moses’ initial openness led to the knowledge of God which led to fruitful and life-giving obedience.

Pharaoh’s question is the question of a cynic, not a seeker. His fist is clenched around power and his heart is hard. Pharaoh never tried. He scoffed at Moses’ God and played the bully. He willfully resisted learning from the opportunities God gave him to change. And he didn’t obey the Lord until he was heartbroken and devastated.

Take some time today and reflect on your own experience of coming to know the Lord. What has that experience been like for you? Where are you on the journey? How are you growing in your relationship with the Lord in this season of your life? Where are you resisting him?