Plagues & More Plagues

Well, good morning. I’m Pastor Ben.

It is my privilege to share from God’s Word with you this morning. A special welcome to anyone that’s a guest. We’re glad that you’re joining us for worship.

And of course, welcome to those that are joining us online as well, including First Lutheran Algonac as they’re worshiping with us too. Well, we find ourselves in week 10. If you’ve been tracking along with us, we’re doing 12 weeks in the book of Exodus.

We’re going to work our way through the entire book of Exodus at some point. We’re going to take a break here in a few weeks though. And here is the remainder of the coming weeks.

You can see that this week had some homework. Who did their homework this week? Who did their homework? Okay, not everybody. All right.

Well, we have something for you, even if you didn’t do it. So there’s a video that went out that was a summary. It was the reading of all these verses.

We’re not going to read all 108 verses today. But the video that went out about 15, maybe 16 minutes, that was a great reading. Of it, that summarized nine plagues between Exodus 7, 14, and then all the way through chapter 10 as well.

Actually, I have another verse. So we’re going to do 108 and a half verses today, I guess. Because here’s a half verse I’m stealing from next week.

But it’s going to be important. We’re going to watch just an abbreviated version of the video. So it’ll be top of mind of what all these plagues were and what was going on.

But this verse actually tells us a lot about what was going on in each of these plagues. And it says this. And on all the gods of Egypt, I will execute judgments.

I am the Lord. And that what we can see is that God is doing multiple things at the same time through all these plagues. But one of the things he’s doing is he’s unraveling their whole theology and their whole order and structure that they had in Egypt.

And he’s basically going and dismantling each of these gods one by one of the things that they trusted in. So that they could see who the real God was. The other thing that I’ll encourage you to do because you’re probably not all that familiar with Egyptian gods.

If I’m gonna guess. But the thing that you should watch for and you should be listening for as we watch this abbreviated video is what patterns do you notice? Is there any pattern that you see in the communication or in what’s happening with Pharaoh? And so with that, I invite you to turn your attention to the screen. Then the Lord said to Moses, Pharaoh’s heart is hardened.

He refuses to let the people go. Go to Pharaoh in the morning as he’s going out of the water. And you shall say to him, the Lord, the God of the Hebrews sent me to you saying, let my people go that they may serve me in the wilderness.

But so far you have not obeyed. Thus said the Lord, by this you shall know that I am the Lord. Behold, with the staff that is in my hand, I will strike the water that is in the Nile and it shall turn into blood.

And the Lord said to Moses, say to Aaron, take your staff and stretch out your hand over the waters of Egypt. Moses and Aaron did as the Lord commanded. In the sight of Pharaoh and in the sight of his servants, he lifted up the staff and struck the water in the Nile and all the water in the Nile turned into blood.

Seven full days passed after the Lord had struck the Nile. Then the Lord said to Moses, go into Pharaoh and say to him, thus says the Lord, let my people go that they may serve me. But if you refuse to let them go, behold, I will plague all your country with frogs.

The frogs shall come up on you and on your people and on all of your servants. So Aaron stretched out his hand over the waters of Egypt and the frogs came up and covered the land of Egypt. But when Pharaoh saw that there was a respite, he hardened his heart and would not listen to them as the Lord had said.

Then the Lord said to Moses, say to Aaron, stretch out your staff and strike the dust of the earth so that it may become gnats in all the land of Egypt. All the dust of the earth became gnats in all the land of Egypt. But Pharaoh’s heart was hardened and he would not listen to them as the Lord had said.

Then the Lord said to Moses, rise up early in the morning and present yourself to Pharaoh as he goes out to the water and say to him, thus says the Lord, let my people go that they may serve me. Or else, if you will not let my people go, behold, I will send swarms of flies on you and your servants and your people and into your houses. And the Lord did so.

There came great swarms of flies into the house of Pharaoh and into his servants’ houses. But Pharaoh hardened his heart this time also and did not let the people go. Then the Lord said to Moses, go into Pharaoh and say to him, thus says the Lord, the God of the Hebrews, let my people go that they may serve me.

For if you refuse to let them go and still hold them, behold, the hand of the Lord will fall with a very severe plague upon your livestock that are in the field, the horses, the donkeys, the camels, the herds and the flocks. But the Lord will make a distinction between the livestock of Israel and the livestock of Egypt, so that nothing of all that belongs to the people of Israel shall die. And the Lord said to Moses and Aaron, take handfuls of soot from the kiln and let Moses throw them in the air in the sight of Pharaoh.

It shall become fine dust over all the land of Egypt and become boils breaking out and sores on man and beast throughout all the land of Egypt. So they took soot from the kiln and stood before Pharaoh. And Moses threw it in the air and it became boils breaking out and sores on man and beast.

But the Lord hardened the heart of Pharaoh and he did not listen to them as the Lord had spoken to Moses. Then the Lord said to Moses, rise up early in the morning and present yourself before Pharaoh and say to him, thus says the Lord, the God of the Hebrews, let my people go that they may serve me. For this time I will send all my plagues on you yourself and on your servants and your people so that you may know that there is none like me in all the earth.

For by now I could have put out my hand and struck you and your people with pestilence and you would have been cut off from the earth. But for this purpose, I have raised you up to show you my power so that my name may be proclaimed in all the earth. You are still exalting yourself against my people and will not let them go.

Behold, about this time tomorrow, I will cause very heavy hail to fall such as never has been in Egypt from the day it was founded until now. Then Moses stretched out his staff toward heaven and the Lord sent thunder and hail and fire rain down to earth. But when Pharaoh saw that the rain and the hail and the thunder had ceased, he sinned yet again and hardened his heart, he and his servants.

So the heart of Pharaoh was hardened and he did not let the people of Israel go just as the Lord had spoken through Moses. So Moses and Aaron went into Pharaoh and said to him, thus says the Lord, the God of the Hebrews, how long will you refuse to humble yourself before me? Let my people go that they may serve me. For if you refuse to let my people go, behold, tomorrow I will bring locusts into your country and they shall cover the face of the land so that no one can see the land.

So Moses stretched out his staff over the land of Egypt and the Lord brought an east wind upon the land all that day and all that night. But the Lord hardened Pharaoh’s heart and he did not let the people of Israel go. Then the Lord said to Moses, stretch out your hand toward heaven that there may be darkness over the land of Egypt, a darkness to be felt.

So Moses stretched out his hand toward heaven and there was a pitch darkness in all the land of Egypt three days. But the Lord hardened Pharaoh’s heart and he would not let them go. Okay, so you got all that, right? Yeah, you tracked it all? Let’s see, it was in there in the video.

And a little, a little bit of it was who hardened Pharaoh’s heart? Who, who started to harden Pharaoh’s heart? Pharaoh. Pharaoh started to harden his own heart. This is one of the things that becomes confusing for us.

When we look at the text, we go, oh my goodness, like God’s coming in and he’s like hardening Pharaoh’s heart. If you look at it in the first few plagues, Pharaoh is the one who’s hardening his own heart. It’s important for us to recognize too because our God is not a God, God’s gracious, he’s merciful, he is long-suffering, he is very, very patient with all of us and he’s even patient with Pharaoh.

But eventually, he’ll hand us over to our own desires. It’s an interesting thing to see there. And then in the later plagues, then we do see that God is ultimately the one hardening his heart.

Well, it does have to raise some questions here because you heard right there that God said, well, I could have caused pestilence, I could have wiped you all out, but there’s a reason behind what I’m doing. There’s actually at least three reasons I can see from the text and around the text, there might be even more than this. But the purposes of the plagues, why plagues? Why 10 plagues when God could have in an instant just set his people free? I mean, he could have transported his people right to the promised land, right where he wanted them.

But we see that our God has more in store and more planned. One of the reasons would be that he needs Egypt to know that Yahweh is the one true God. By extension to that the world would come to know that Yahweh is the one true God.

That Israel would also know that they are God’s people. Because you heard each time that Moses and Aaron are going and petitioning before the Pharaoh, that they want the people to be free so that they can do what? So they can serve, go worship the Lord because what do God’s people do? They worship and they serve him. So they to be set apart to be God’s people.

They would know who the one true God is and that he’s chosen them. And that we can’t miss this as well. Even for as uncomfortable it is that judgment is real, that God will not be mocked and that he will execute judgment on those that are apart from him.

Going back to the first point too, actually if you looked outside this text, you look at Joshua 9, 9, it says, the Gibeonites knew and had heard of all that God had done in Egypt. So later on in the next generation, when Joshua’s leading all these Israelites into the promised land, way down the road, that even then the repercussions, the ripple effects, the message had been heard throughout other populations about what God is doing here and now through all these plagues. I told you to watch for a pattern.

I don’t know if anyone caught this in their reading. If you did, you get a gold star. Because I didn’t see this until I went through it this week, that there’s actually a pattern in each way that Moses and Aaron are told to go approach Pharaoh.

That they’re first told, go down to the Nile and talk to him there. Rise up early in the morning, go down to the Nile because that’s where Pharaoh is going to be. That’s one.

Then two, go to him in his court, go before him. And then three, there’s no conversation, there’s just a plague. And then four, back at the Nile.

Five, in his court. Six, no conversation, just a plague. And then seven, eight, nine, it just follows this pattern for whatever reason that God is saying, this is how I’m slowly gonna lead into these conversations.

We’re going to try to, he’s gonna show who he truly is in all of this and why this pattern. You know what, I’m not entirely sure. But it’s just an interesting thing to know.

And so let’s start at the beginning. We’re not gonna go through every plague, so I’ll just, I’ll let you off the hook there so you know, like no one’s gonna be watching. But it’s gonna start down here and following in the same vein as Pastor Tim’s been doing.

You know, here’s an image for you, those folks that like images and learn in that way. The Pharaoh is down at the Nile early in the morning. For what reason, we don’t necessarily know, but we do know this, that the Nile would be the lifeblood of all of Egypt.

It’s what helps water the crops, it’s where they’re gonna get their drinking water, it’s how they water their animals. This is their source of life. And so Pharaoh’s going down there in the morning and Moses and Aaron come before him.

They strike the water with the staff and it turns to blood. And if you did your homework and you read in the text, it’s not only the Nile, but if there was water in jars or in barrels throughout the land of Egypt, those also turned to blood. And that people actually had to dig along the sides of the banks of the Nile to try to find fresh water because you need water to live.

And if you were with us last week, you saw these other characters on the scene. The magicians, the council around the Pharaoh, that they come and they do their secret arts. And we’re not entirely sure if these are demonic type things that they’re doing or if they’re parlor tricks, but they are able to replicate satisfactory water to blood for Pharaoh.

So Pharaoh’s heart remained hardened and he would not listen to them. As the Lord had said. Another way to put this is that the Pharaoh stayed in denial.

You guys did so much better than the first service too. Thank you so much. All right, you got to slip in one dad joke for a service.

But in all seriousness, he’s in denial. He’s like, okay, so they can do it. You did it.

Okay, my guys can do that same thing. No big deal. Like we’re still good.

I’m not setting you free. And then they go before him in the court. And then Moses tells him that frogs are going to come.

And here’s a second plague. And that there’s going to be basically swarms of frogs. And just zoom in on this for just a moment.

Moses said, the Nile shall swarm with frogs that shall come up into your house and into your bedroom and on your bed and into the house of your servants and your people and into your ovens and your kneading bowls. The frogs shall come upon you and your people and all your servants. Now, this is one of these moments where I think it’s important for us to recognize that we’re not just reading some fairy tale.

That this is a narrative that this actually took place. And to try to put ourselves in this situation for just a moment to understand just how, okay, you just lost all your drinking water. Okay, that’s a pretty serious thing, right? You’re not going to survive more than a few days without water.

And okay, frogs, that seems like it might be a little bit unpleasant. Swarms of frogs in your beds, frogs in your kitchen. How many of you have ever had some type of critter or bug in your house that did not belong? Even just one.

And how uncomfortable was that? A number of years ago, I was living down in Texas and down there, they don’t have basements. So all the HVAC stuff is in your attic along with the intake and everything for your HVAC system. My wife’s sitting in the living room in the evening after.

We put our son to bed. We’re just, you know, unwinding for the evening. And out of one of the intakes or one of the vents falls the world’s biggest cockroach right onto her.

And she jumps up out of the way. I, you know, I jump up ready to take it on. And he goes under the chair.

So I pick up the chair with one hand. I flip it over. And then he goes towards darkness.

So he goes on the couch. I pick that up with one finger and I flip it over. Eventually, I crush this thing, kill it in the process, destroying my entire living room because of one bug, right? So for just a moment, if we can get there, these frogs and what a nuisance that if you went to lay your head down, that there’s frogs on top of you, they’re croaking next to you, that they’re all over the things you’re trying to cook with.

I mean, it’s really, really hard to imagine. And so this is affecting, obviously, all the people of Egypt and also the Israelites as well at this point. And then Pharaoh finally calls, get Moses and Aaron over here.

And he says, tell, you know, pray that this would go away, that the frogs would go away. And I think in kind of a snarky way, Moses replies, okay, okay, Pharaoh. Okay, you know, king of Egypt, when would you like me to say the prayer? And Pharaoh, we start to see the pride and the hardness of his heart really begin to show because he says, tomorrow.

Yeah, I’m fine with the frogs right now. You know what, since I’m in control and I’m so powerful, you know what? Yeah, tomorrow will be fine. Like why he’s trying to hang on to some semblance of control.

He needs Moses, he needs Aaron. They are the ones that have the one true God, the ones that can take the frogs away. The other thing that’s interesting to note on this plague as well is that the magicians were able to produce frogs as well, which I just find hilarious.

You already have swarms of frogs like all over in people’s cupboards and everywhere. And the magicians are like, you know what’s a good idea? More frogs, like that’s what we need to do. And they’re unable to get rid of the frogs.

It’s just a really curious thing. But we start to see patterns here. But when Pharaoh saw that there was a respite, right? The frogs are gone now.

They had to pile them up and it began to stink in the whole land. But when he saw the frogs are gone, he gets his respite, he hardened his heart and would not listen to them as the Lord had said. And for a moment, we can pause.

What about you? How many of us have had something that has weighed heavy on our heart and our knees have hit the floor and we pray to God again and again, day in and out, morning and evening, we pray to him and we come before him and we finally get the answer that we’re desiring. We finally get God’s yes. And then let me ask you, when that respite comes, what’s your prayer life look like the next day? You get the respite that you want, you got the answer that you wanted, you got the thing from God, but you still come before him.

Do you come before him with gratitude and thanks and praise? And you keep conversation with him or do you go, okay, I got what I wanted. I’m gonna go on living my life. The other interesting thing to know in these patterns as well that we see is that Pharaoh is making commitments all along the way.

He is saying that he’s going to do things and he doesn’t follow through and that all of us have to know in different circumstances and different situations in our life that there have been times when people have made a commitment to you. They made a promise to you. They made an agreement.

They entered into a promise with you and they didn’t follow through. That could be that they promised that they were gonna be there for you. They were gonna pick you up at a certain time.

They were gonna go do something with you, whatever it may be. But how about you when it comes to those as well? When you’ve made a commitment to work, when you’ve made a commitment to a sports team, a coach, when you’ve made a commitment to friends, when you’ve made a commitment to a spouse and that you stood before God and family and friends and said that you were gonna love them till death do you part, that nothing would separate you and that you would have undivided devoted love to them. And has it stayed that way? I believe that all of us would have to answer that no, that we don’t even follow through with our commitments as well.

The more and more that we look at this text too, you’re gonna try to find yourself in a text, you’re not gonna find yourself being Moses. You’re not Aaron. You’re not the Israelites.

The more and more we see ourselves to be just like Pharaoh. The third plague comes along, Nats. Remember follows a pattern, they went to the Nile, they went to the court, now they don’t even talk and they send Nats.

The magicians tried their secret arts to produce Nats, but they could not. I just find this curious. You can turn water to blood, you can make a snake out of a staff, you can produce frogs somehow, but you can’t make bugs.

Like I just think it’s kind of an interesting thing. Like you can’t, we don’t do bugs, like we don’t do Nats. So there were Nats on man and beast.

The magician said to Pharaoh, this was the thing that convinced the magicians that there’s something going on here that’s not just a parlor trick, but that this is the finger of God. But here it is again, but Pharaoh’s heart was hardened. He’s the one hardening his heart at this point.

And he said he would not listen to them as the Lord had said. An interesting thing to note about this phrase, the finger of God, it’s not only found here, it’s found throughout scripture in a few different places. But that Jesus himself in Luke 11, when Pharisees are coming to Jesus because Jesus is casting out demons, and they’re saying that he’s doing so by Beelzebub, that Jesus is casting out demons because he’s of Satan, that Jesus actually tells them, no, he’s casting them out by the finger of God.

Which for them, if they knew their scripture would call back to mind, oh, this miraculous thing you’re doing here is the same miracle working, plague producing power of the one true God. Yet they didn’t see it. We move into the fourth, and this is where something changes all of a sudden.

Moses said, on that day, I will set apart the land of Goshen. This is the fourth plague, which would be flies. So we move from little bugs to slightly bigger bugs.

And where my people will dwell so that no swarms of flies shall be there, that you may know that I am the Lord in the midst of the earth. Thus, I will put a division between my people and your people. Tomorrow, this sign shall happen.

Up until this point, plagues one, two, and three affected the entirety of the land of Egypt and the land that the Israelites were living. To give you an idea of what this might look like is the land of Goshen is the land that we’re told that Joseph and his entire family at the end of the book of Genesis that they move and this is where they settled. So this is where the Hebrew people are.

And so these first three plagues have affected the Hebrew people. And now God says, I’m going to create a divide. Everything else that follows, four all the way through, nine, and then we see something change next week with ten.

That there’s no more judgment being poured out on the Hebrew people. No more plagues. No locusts for them.

No boils for them. No hail for them. No darkness for them.

And let me ask you this. What exactly is it that the Hebrew people did to deserve that? Absolutely nothing. It is complete mercy and grace that God looked upon these people and said, they are mine.

I’m setting them apart. They’ve not done anything to this point to deserve. This is unmerited favor and grace that God is now giving these people because he loves them.

And that’s the only reason why. And he continues to pour out his judgment on the Egyptians. Then we find ourselves here where we’re going to watch a pattern continue to unfold with Pharaoh.

He has pride. He has a hardening heart. And then we see him try to bargain and try to compromise because of these flies and all that has cost him.

He knows that the people want to go. They want to leave and they want to serve their God. They want to worship their God.

Pharaoh called Moses and Aaron and said, go sacrifice to your God. And he adds like this clause, right? This condition within the land. No three-day journey.

No, no, no, no. You need to be within the land. I don’t want you to go anywhere.

But Moses said, that’s not right. For the offerings we shall sacrifice to our Lord are an abomination to the Egyptians. If we sacrifice offerings abominable to the Egyptians before their eyes, will they not stone us? We know this.

They’re in Goshen because they’re shepherds, because they have sheep. And sacrifices within their system would have likely involved sheep. Also, if it involved any type of cow or heifer, that would have been a God in the eyes or a deity in the eyes of the Egyptians as well.

And they know this full well. We’re not going to do this. And they also know, most importantly, that’s not what God told us.

God is not in the business of bargains. God is not in the business of compromising with his people. What he says is final.

Yet, just like Pharaoh, Christians today can still do this very thing that we want to compromise our faith. Sure, God, I’m going to give you an hour on Sunday morning. But you know what? The rest of the week, the other 176 hours in the week, I want to live in Egypt.

Yeah, God, I’m going to give you this part of my life, this area of my life, but these habits and these things that I’ve, these well-worn paths in my life about who I associate with and how I talk and what kind of, if I might overindulge in alcohol, maybe I’ll do other things that really don’t belong within your kingdom. You know what? I’m just going to go ahead and continue to live in Egypt. I’m going to do it within this, I’m going to worship you at the same time.

I’m going to try to create some sort of compromise and bargain with you. God, I want to give you all my life. I don’t want you to, I don’t want you to dictate how I should spend my time, how I speak, how I treat people, how I spend my finances, what I watch on screens.

God, God, no, no, no. I just want to give you that one hour a week. Maybe I’ll read a Bible verse.

This is the compromise I have for you because I know I’m just a Christian otherwise. We can be just like Pharaoh, again, wanting to compromise and wanting to bargain. This is the problem with pride.

Pride is not simply just being stubborn. Pride insists that God must work on our terms, that we want to be the ones that dictate, that we want to be able to one to bargain with him and tell him how things really should be. God, I’ll go ahead and move an inch if you do.

Let’s meet in the middle somewhere when his good and perfect will for our lives is very clear of how he wants us to live, how he wants us to conduct ourselves. Yet all too often, we want to make a deal. We know that he’s merciful and gracious.

He knows he’s going to forgive us. So let’s go ahead and live in Egypt a little bit longer. Eventually, it seems like it gets through.

And so with the plague of locusts, Pharaoh hastily comes to Moses and Aaron. And you get this glimmer of hope where you think maybe, maybe finally his hardened heart begins to chip away. And he says, I have sinned against the Lord, your God, and against you.

This is amazing. Now, therefore, forgive my sin. Please, only this once and plead with your Lord, your God, only to remove this death from me, these locusts.

So he went out from Pharaoh and pleaded with the Lord. This is astounding too, that we have to take note of as well, that Moses, Moses, who would have been murdered because of the Egyptian Pharaoh. Moses, who knows his people have been enslaved for his entirety of his life.

I mean, he’s 80 years. All he knows is that his people have been enslaved. They’ve been enslaved in Egypt for 400 years.

And he’s willing to go to that leader, that king, that true enemy of his who’s oppressing his people and won’t let him worship the one true God. And he intercedes on behalf of his enemy. And he, and he prays, the Lord turned the wind, the very strong wind, west wind, which lifted the locusts and drove them into the Red Sea.

Not a single locust was left in that country, but the Lord hardens Pharaoh’s heart. Here we see the hardening now coming from God, giving Pharaoh fully over to the thing that he desires, to be separated from God. And he did not let his people go.

Well, this is a curious thing. I think it’s worthwhile to zoom in on for just a moment because what it seems like here at the very top, it’s like that he recognizes what we would hope that any of us would recognize, that he sinned against God. He sinned against Moses.

He’s asking for forgiveness of sins. So let me ask you this. There’s two parts.

There’s two parts to true confession. The first part is what we call contrition, godly sorrow, not whoops, sorry, I got caught. Sorry, I’m having consequences.

Sorry that you sinned against the one true God. That type of sorrow. Sorrow for the sin and brokenness that resides in you, that’s now affecting those that are around you.

Contrition. Whether he has contrition, we don’t know. But let me ask you whether or not he has contrition, what do you believe is the second part of repentance? What comes along with contrition? Turn away, turn away.

What would you call it? Obedience, right? That’s our natural inclination. It’s not the second part of repentance. That’s often when we talk about it’s a turning away and that’s a correct term.

But when you dig down into what confession is itself is that there’s godly sorrow and godly sorrow can only come before in true confession when you’re confessing it in faith. That you’re confessing it with confidence that the one you’re confessing it to is merciful, is loving, and will forgive you. So that even when we confess our sins before we take communion here it’s not that you you’re focused on just how sorry you are but you’re also at the same time simultaneously focused on how good he is and that god is not doing an exchange with you because you feel really sorry you’re going to get forgiveness of your sins.

Your sins are already forgiven because they were nailed to a tree 2,000 years ago and now by faith you receive that forgiveness that’s already been won for you. And what we know full well is that pharaoh whether or not he has any type of contrition we don’t know but what we do know is he does not have faith. He does not believe in the one true god that his repentance here was not true repentance so there could be no obedience that follows.

It’s important for us to see that not only for pharaoh but even for our own lives that if we move from sorrow to obedience sorrow to obedience but never actually confessing contrition with faith that then leads to a new life we’re going to continue to live in the same pattern and this is what the pattern looks like. You’ve seen it there’s the pressure there’s the plague okay god that’s enough call it off I promise I’ll change I promise you guys can go I promise you know you guys can you can leave you can first you can sacrifice here or no you can leave with your women and children or you know what you can leave but just don’t take your animals like I’m going to make a promise or I’m going to let you go and then the respite the relief never mind like you don’t get to go you’re still enslaved and then the hardening okay I got the relief okay I don’t have to worry about that anymore I still got all my slaves I still have my kingdom that’s all he’s concerned about and then this ninth plague comes Moses stretched his hand towards heaven and there was pitch darkness in all the land of Egypt for three days this is interesting to know too one of pharaoh’s key roles being the god king that he was was that if you’re with us last week there was this thing that pastor Tim talked about the tannin right the tannin which is this serpent this chaos creature well in their culture what they would have understood is that every single night the tannin the chaos creature is chasing away the sun and the pharaoh’s job was to chase away the tannin so that the sun would return each morning and by the sun not coming out for three days it would be showing the pharaoh to be completely inadequate completely neutered completely incapable of doing anything that he’s supposed to do he’s supposed to make sure the chaos stays away so order can be maintained and that the sun god will return and for three days all the Egyptians see that the one that is sitting in power the one that they’re trusting in for order is not able to do the thing he does and you could imagine how the Egyptians would feel then imagine how we feel when we have to pay seven dollars for a dozen eggs and we look to our leaders and we go what are you doing why do I have to pay so much for gas why is this going on what’s going on when you look to your leadership and you go what’s going on here the Egyptian people now the sun our water was turned to blood all these things have come upon us and now the thing that you’re called to do as our pharaoh making sure the sun returns each morning and you’re unable to do it and they did not see one another nor do they rise from the place for three days but all the people of Israel had light there it is again in Goshen here’s grace and mercy and light and abundance for all of you guess what you’re my chosen you’re loved and not because you did anything but just because I love you the pharaoh called Moses and said go serve the lord your little ones may also go with you because there’s been this wrestling back and forth who can leave it’s not just going to be the men now the little ones can go with you the women can go with you but leave your flocks and your herds here because he wants to have something he’s still trying to bargain still trying to compromise somehow said another way as you look at all this that God brought physical darkness in this plague however pharaoh was already living in his spiritual darkness and the sin that he had wasn’t just sin of simply breaking God’s rules but a sin that he was bound to and blinded by is that he couldn’t see the one true God even though all across all of these plagues it seems like it become clearer and clearer I mean the magician started to get a hint of that hey pharaoh there’s something wrong here yet pharaoh’s heart is so hard that even the wise counsel around him he’s still not willing he has hardened hearts and he’s closed up his ears he’s not willing to hear anything which for me raises this question how dense could this guy be? and it actually then shows us this who is really in slavery in this narrative and it’s not the Hebrew people yes they are in physical slavery they’ve been enslaved for 400 years but I believe a close reading this text would show us that the pharaoh himself is enslaved to his own sin the sin is lording over him and is the master of him and he is not willing to turn from his ways he’s not willing to fully repent he’s not willing to fully open his eyes to who God is and he yields himself to that sin and that this type of slavery this spiritual slavery is far deeper than any type of physical slavery could be and that he needs something outside of himself to free him from the bondage that he has himself in and so for a moment if we go back actually to the seventh plague the seventh plague where hail is falling there’s a few interesting things to note about this plague first off is that there is a message that this hail is coming but also a message of get everyone inside even you Egyptian people even you enemy people get inside and get your livestock inside I’m giving you this warning otherwise you will die this message of judgment but also the message of judgment coming and that if you heed it it’s received as mercy because now your life is spared but I believe the most interesting thing to note about this plague is that when Pharaoh comes to him comes to Moses the intercessor and says pray for us that this hail would stop that people would stop dying is that we see Moses goes outside the city walls with his staff and he stretches out his arms and he intercedes for the life of his enemy which is an exact parallel exact foreshadowing of Christ who is to come that outside the walls of Jerusalem that Jesus would willingly climb up a hill with a bloodied and beaten back betrayed by his best friends betrayed by the people he was sent to save and that he would go up onto a tree and that he would yield his spirit in our place that he would stretch out his arms outside those city walls that he might intercede and be our mediator and that he might say that they have sinned that they are in utter darkness that they’re enslaved to their sin and their hearts are hard I’ve told them how to live but they just want to live in Egypt they just want to live life on their own terms and they don’t want to admit who I truly am and despite the hardness of their heart he gave his life for all who would come to see who he truly is Galatians put it this way for freedom Christ has set us free that we were the ones like Pharaoh with hardened hearts and closed up ears and unwilling to yield our lives to the perfect will of our God that we weren’t willing to recognize him for who he truly is and now we’re called to stand firm and do not submit again to a yoke of slavery don’t fall back into the patterns of Egypt don’t fall back into the patterns of sin that are the well-worn paths in all of our lives no you’ve been freed not of any doing of yourself but that the goodness and the graciousness of a God who’s looked upon you and loved you enough that nails would pierce his hands that he would give up his breath and that he would say as an intercessor it is finished and that no longer would we have these hardened stone hearts as Ezekiel puts it but rather that God would come to each of us and he’d give us a heart of flesh one that is soft one that is not perfect but one that is attuned by the Holy Spirit to recognize when we are out of step with God’s will for our life and so now our call is not to live perfect lives but live lives recognizing first and foremost who our God is and recognizing the frailty and the weakness of our flesh and coming before him again and again in true repentance contrite because we’ve sinned against the one true God but also in faith knowing that he has indeed forgiven us I’ll close with this thought as well we look at all these plagues and we see that this multifaceted the purposes that God has behind it but this these verses from John really do clarify not only what the plagues are doing but what all scripture we see these supernatural events taking place even the supernatural things that Jesus was doing through his signs and wonders that this is what we hear from the book of John that now Jesus did many other signs of the presence of the disciples these miracles these things that are on scale with these plagues what’s going on here why are these happening well these things are written these things have happened so that you might believe that Jesus is the Christ the Son of God and that by believing you may have life in his name take the scales off your eyes open your ears break that hardened heart that you could see who he truly is and that in him is where your life is found in him your confidence is found in him you trust and live and move and have your being every day and so that as we look at this story as we as we’ve as you’ve read through these plagues as you listen this morning as you remember the mighty hand of your God that you would remember too that you are freed no longer slave to sin no longer with a hard heart and not not called to be perfect people to be called to be led by him day in and day out a God who is merciful and gracious and willing to pour out his mercy on you new each and every morning as we stumble forward in our lives seeking to follow him as he powers us by his Holy Spirit amen will you join me in prayer gracious heavenly father God we thank you for your word God we thank you for the clarity of why these plagues happen the majesty of your power and your might God that you would make your name known throughout all the world and that you would make your name known even here and that your mighty name is Jesus it is by his name that we have been saved it is by his work that now we know God that you through Jesus Christ have forgiven us of all of our sin all of our hardness and all of our wrongdoings and turning from your good and perfect will for our lives God we pray that we would be a people that would live with softened hearts attuned to you by your spirit that we would be able to live lives that are pleasing in your sight and to share the good news of what your son has not only done for us but has done for all I pray this in his name Amen