Moses Before Pharoah (Part 1) Exodus 7:14 - 8:19

The Lord tells us that we are to share the message of Jesus Christ with other people matter of fact he says we’re to go into, “All the world”, and preach the gospel to everyone. You can present the gospel to somebody, and they readily respond to the message, and it has sometimes been said that it’s like standing under a fruit tree and just holding your hand out and the fruit drops, and it’s that easy. But more often than that it more difficult, on other you discover that some people that don’t know the Lord are very stubborn. Some people just don’t want to hear it. So, what do say to a stubborn person that doesn’t know the word or maybe a better question would be how does the Lord deal with such people.

If you are looking for a case in the bible that illustrates God dealing with a stubborn person look no further then Pharoah. Pharoah was as stubborn as anybody in the Bible, so seeing how the Lord dealt with him can give us some insights in what we do wish people that don’t know the Lord. In going through the book of exodus, we have come to what is the beginning of the 10 plagues, today we’re going to start that study and it’s gonna continue for several episodes, so let me begin by giving a word about how those ten plagues are related to each other.

In the Bible the 10 plagues can be divided into 3 three, threes and then a plus one.

If you look carefully at the say the nine, the 10th one based around the Passover,  so my plan is to look at each of the three sets of three and look at the details carefully, what you will discover then in each of the three sets is  the first plague is introduced by the words in the morning, so if you just read the nine and the first one it says in the morning, then again the fourth one again says, in the morning and then hehe 7th it again says in the morning. That’s sort of a clue that there is a a grouping of the 9 into sets of three also in each set of three the first plague in each set contains a purpose statement given on a new day.

We’ll look at those as we go through the 9 in each of the three sets noting that  Moses announces the coming of the plague before in the first two groups but in each of the three sets the last plague comes without a warning.

To say that same thing you’ve got three sets in each set there’s a warning in the first two and the third there’s no warning, the same thing happens in the second set and the same thing happens in the third set so if you look at the details it becomes obvious that there is some deliberate grouping of the man into three sets of three. There are all kinds of observations that have be made concerning the three sets but clearly a distinction of the nine into three groups. The first three caused inconvenience, the second turned the screw and were annoying, and the third three proved costly but the last one was devastating.

To say that same thing another way they get worse as they go on.

Today I want us to look at the first set of three and this alone will give us some insight into how God deals with the stubborn unbeliever so turn with me to exodus Chapter 7 and we’re going to pick up where we left off last time. We’re going to look at Chapter 7 and we’re gonna look at at least some of chapter eight so the first three straddle these two chapters. Let me just tell you up front that the first plague is the Nile gets changed to blood, in the second plague frogs invade the land, and in the third lice invade the people. So, we’re going to talk tonight about blood, frogs, and lice. It’s going to go from the Nile to land to the people and it’s going to get progressively more and more personal and close to the people. Let’s start with the first plague which has to do with the Nile being turned to blood.

The First Plague: Waters Become Blood.

14 So the Lord said to Moses: “Pharaoh’s heart is hard; he refuses to let the people go. 15 Go to Pharaoh in the morning, when he goes out to the water, and you shall stand by the river’s bank to meet him; and the rod which was turned to a serpent you shall take in your hand. 

(Exodus 7: 14-15)

So, at this point the Lord is simply giving Moses a Commission to go meet Pharoah, but this time down by the riverside in this case being the Nile. We are told in the Psalms (73) that this takes place at Zorn which is in the northern part of Egypt that’s not said here but it said there. It should also be noted that the Nile represented to the Egyptians a number of different gods. To really understand what’s going on you need to know that the Egyptians considered the Nile River a God and the home of several other gods where which you could go and have a religious encounter with them.

16 And you shall say to him, ‘The Lord God of the Hebrews has sent me to you, saying, “Let My people go, that they may serve Me in the wilderness”; but indeed, until now you would not hear! 17 Thus says the Lord: “By this you shall know that I am the Lord. Behold, I will strike the waters which are in the river with the rod that is in my hand, and they shall be turned to blood. 18 And the fish that are in the river shall die, the river shall stink, and the Egyptians will loathe to drink the water of the river.” 

(Exodus 7: 16-18)

By making the Nile turn to blood Moses is demonstrating that he has power or at least God has power over the gods of the Egyptians and that’s the point of this. So, this miracle is going to demonstrate that Moses God is dominant over the gods of the Egyptians, also he’s going to do this supernaturally. This is not a natural phenomenon this is the supernatural act of the God of Moses.

19 Then the Lord spoke to Moses, “Say to Aaron, ‘Take your rod and stretch out your hand over the waters of Egypt, over their streams, over their rivers, over their ponds, and over all their pools of water, that they may become blood. And there shall be blood throughout all the land of Egypt, both in buckets of wood and pitchers of stone.’ ” 

(Exodus 7: 19)

So, it seems it’s not just the water of the Nile that turns to blood, water everywhere. In a minute we’re going to see that the magicians of Egypt found some water to turn to blood themselves so apparently there was some water that was not turned to blood, or they brought some in from outside the region but then in verse 20 we see.

20 And Moses and Aaron did so, just as the Lord commanded. So, he lifted up the rod and struck the waters that were in the river, in the sight of Pharaoh and in the sight of his servants. And all the waters that were in the river were turned to blood. 21 The fish that were in the river died, the river stank, and the Egyptians could not drink the water of the river. So, there was blood throughout all the land of Egypt.

(Exodus 7: 20-21)

Again, I pointed out last time, several times it is said in that Moses and Aaron did just as the Lord commanded them, and that’s repeated here again in verse 20. They did just exactly what the Lord told them to do but now the magicians appear again.

22 Then the magicians of Egypt did so with their enchantments; and Pharaoh’s heart grew hard, and he did not heed them, as the Lord had said. 23 And Pharaoh turned and went into his house. Neither was his heart moved by this. 24 So all the Egyptians dug all around the river for water to drink, because they could not drink the water of the river. 25 And seven days passed after the Lord had struck the river.

(Exodus 7: 22-25)

So, we’re told then the magicians of Egypt did the same by their enchantments and also that Pharaoh’s heart grew hard again and he did not listen to them or the Lord.

I mentioned a minute ago there was other water in Egypt and the magicians used that water to produce and duplicate the miracle that they had done also I pointed out last time that they duplicated miracle before this and that they’re indications elsewhere in the scripture that Satan in some situations can do counterfeit supernatural things and that is no doubt the case here. These are unbelieving Pagan priests of Pagan gods and yet they apparently can do some supernatural things. So put yourself in Moses shoes, these guys are coming back with counterfeit supernatural powers and doing similar things to what he was doing. All we can say is at this point the miracle didn’t help, and Pharaoh’s  heart was not moved towards God.

Seven days pass.  But remember, the Lord said up front to Moses we’re going to do all this and he’s not going to respond. Perhaps we could conclude from this that just because somebody rejects the Lord doesn’t mean that we shouldn’t tell them about the Lord anyway.  Just because somebody refuses to trust the Lord the first time doesn’t mean we stop there, at any rate what the Lord did was send him a message reinforced by a supernatural miracle of turning the Nile into blood and  that’s the first plague.

The Second Plague: Frogs.

1 And the Lord spoke to Moses, “Go to Pharaoh and say to him, ‘Thus says the Lord: “Let My people go, that they may serve Me. 2 But if you refuse to let them go, behold, I will smite all your territory with frogs. 3 So the river shall bring forth frogs abundantly, which shall go up and come into your house, into your bedroom, on your bed, into the houses of your servants, on your people, into your ovens, and into your kneading bowls. 4 And the frogs shall come up on you, on your people, and on all your servants.” ’ ”

(Exodus 8: 1-4)

Remember that I said that there was a warning in the first two plagues, in each set of three, so this time we see again a warning and the warning is if you don’t let the people go the next thing that’s gonna happen to you is you’re gonna have a visitation of frogs. Now we are also told that the frog was one of the gods of the Egyptians. It was supposed to be the God of utility, that it made the women pregnant, and  it made the land produce fruit and crops, so they venerated the frog and worshiped the frog. So, again this is a judgment on one of the Gods of the Egyptians. Only this time it is more personal. This not just that the river where you get your drinking water turning to blood, it’s these frogs are going to crawl everywhere, in your bed , in your food,  they going to get into the mixing bowls and the ovens, you’re going to have frogs everywhere.

5 Then the Lord spoke to Moses, “Say to Aaron, ‘Stretch out your hand with your rod over the streams, over the rivers, and over the ponds, and cause frogs to come up on the land of Egypt.’ ” 6 So Aaron stretched out his hand over the waters of Egypt, and the frogs came up and covered the land of Egypt. 7 And the magicians did so with their enchantments and brought up frogs on the land of Egypt.

(Exodus 8: 5-7)

So once again the magicians did the same thing, is it just me or would it not have been better if they had made the frogs disappear, if they wanted to help, they did the reverse and made the situation worse.

8 Then Pharaoh called for Moses and Aaron, and said, “Entreat the Lord that He may take away the frogs from me and from my people; and I will let the people go, that they may sacrifice to the Lord.” 9 And Moses said to Pharaoh, “Accept the honour of saying when I shall intercede for you, for your servants, and for your people, to destroy the frogs from you and your houses, that they may remain in the river only.” 10 So he said, “Tomorrow.” And he said, “Let it be according to your word, that you may know that there is no one like the Lord our God. 11 And the frogs shall depart from you, from your houses, from your servants, and from your people. They shall remain in the river only.”

(Exodus 8: 8-11)

Now this is really interesting, Pharoah says OK, I’ll let them go and Moses said alright you pick the time for me to destroy all the frogs.

That’s an interesting little twist, here he’s gonna demonstrate that this is not some natural phenomena, he’s going to let Pharoah pick the time, and he will do  it at the time he says, which would indicate a supernatural act. Pharaoh not surprisingly says, “”Tomorrow” and he says it will be done and you will see that there is no one like the Lord our God. That’s what’s going on, I’m gonna let you pick the time we’re going to do it when you pick the time to demonstrate this is supernatural that God is working in this situation.

12 Then Moses and Aaron went out from Pharaoh. And Moses cried out to the Lord concerning the frogs which He had brought against Pharaoh. 13 So the Lord did according to the word of Moses. And the frogs died out of the houses, out of the courtyards, and out of the fields. 14 They gathered them together in heaps, and the land stank.

(Exodus 8: 12-14)

I can’t even imagine how bad that must have been, but Moses fulfilled his part of the deal,  the question is will pharaoh fulfil his and we find out in the next verse.

15 But when Pharaoh saw that there was relief, he hardened his heart and did not heed them, as the Lord had said.

(Exodus 8: 1-15)

Just as the Lord had predicted, he reneged on the deal. He did not do what he said he would do. Pharaoh got a little and he immediately said, I don’t need to do this now, the frogs are gone anyway.  Isn’t that the way it works sometimes, often people get concerned about spiritual things because of some crisis in their life and they get all concerned because of the crisis and they decide they’re going to go to church and as soon as things settle down for them, they disappear again. All of a sudden, they just go back to where they were, and that’s the point, pharaoh was just plain stubborn he would not give an inch. So, what does the Lord d, well I’ve already told you they’re nine of these and we’ve only covered two of them. So, let’s look at one more at least today.

The Third Plague: Lice

16 So the Lord said to Moses, “Say to Aaron, ‘Stretch out your rod, and strike the dust of the land, so that it may become lice throughout all the land of Egypt.’ ” 17 And they did so. For Aaron stretched out his hand with his rod and struck the dust of the earth, and it became lice on man and beast. All the dust of the land became lice throughout all the land of Egypt. 18 Now the magicians so worked with their enchantments to bring forth lice, but they could not. So, there were lice on man and beast. 19 Then the magicians said to Pharaoh, “This is the finger of God.” But Pharaoh’s heart grew hard, and he did not heed them, just as the Lord had said.

(Exodus 8: 16-19)

Alright couple of observations before we go on, I’ve mentioned up front that in each set there’s a warning with the first two and there’s no warning and this demonstrates that. There was a warning when it came to turning the Nile to blood there was a warning when it came to the frogs invading the land, but now he says just do it, and there’s no warning.

Pharaoh decided that he would renege on his promise and so the Lord just says alright send another plague, no warning. Some experts think because it refers to the dust becoming the lice seems to indicate that it might have been a plague of mosquitoes referencing that they we so small and apparently that is a reasonable translation of the what the King James renders “lice”. Whatever they were they were numerous, and they were annoying there were lots and lots and lots of them. Some comment on the fact that they would irritate the skin, and some talked about them getting in your nose. So, we have seen three plagues so far, the drinking water, then it got personal with frogs getting into be with you, and into the food and now it is getting up their noses in a literal sense.

I said at the beginning this is going to get more and more personal, and it is. So first is was water turned to blood all around, now the frogs were in the houses and in the beds remember that even in the ovens the lice were all over their bodies so again Then there is an interesting twist the magicians try and work their enhancements but they could not. It seems they have finally reached their limit and acknowledge it must be the hand of God behind this, yet still it says, Pharoah resisted.

He did not heed them, just as the Lord had said just as the Lord had predicted. The finger of God is obviously a figure of speech for the power of God this is God but look at that phrase again the word God they use is the  generic word for God, aren’t recognizing the Lord they are just recognizing that this is God at work and that this God has power. Even after this God couldn’t get Pharaohs personal attention. He just hardened his heart, and he would not budge. 

So, what do we learn from this, what’s the value to us what’s going on here? Some come to this message, and they want to say that this was a natural phenomenon, for example there were perhaps times in Egypt when frogs did invade the land, that’s not unheard of, that could have been a natural phenomenon. However, in this case that’s not possible because it was timed in that Moses said to pharaoh you named the time. So even if there was a natural force involved it still had a supernatural element behind it. The timing was supernatural, at the very least. 

The other thing is that throughout this passage and in more plagues , these things will occur “So that you may know that I am the Lord”. We are told that the purpose of all this is in essence that they might know that God is sovereign that he has power over them. At any rate there are clear purposes that are stated throughout, and we’ll see that stated again as we go through the rest of the plagues. The other thing that could be mentioned here is the time frame, I’m not gonna go into a lot of detail it gets a little complicated but let me just say that based on what happened they’re connected in some cases with times during the year, so some ingenious commentators have figured out that these plagues started in June and they ended somewhere around April now we know the Passover was in the spring in April, so you back from their you apparently can conclude that it was from perhaps June to April around a 9 or 10 month period these events occur. I say this because I think it is an added insight in how the Lord deals with a stubborn unbeliever.

So, what God does is, number one, he sent his messengers Moses and Aaron. Number two,  he warns pharaoh by sending more than one message, he warned them in the first two plagues, he judged Pharaoh’s gods, he judged their idols he judged the gods and then final he without warning judges him again.

Well, I think there are three lessons here for us.

Number one, we can be a messenger that God chose to speak out and we can deliver the message even to people we know up front won’t accept it. Did you ever did do that, I do that all the time some of the groups I attend. Groups of Philosophers,  Psychologists and atheists and humanists, I try to never think there’s no sense given them the gospel, they’re not going to accept it. Don’t get me wrong I learn a lot and it helps me create defences against these particular worldviews and their attack upon Christianity, but I try not to ever think there is no sense talking to them or it is a waste of time. After all, the Lord told Moses to go talk to pharaoh and said up front he’s not going to accept what you say, go tell him anyway. That occurs elsewhere in the scripture. So, the first lesson we can learn is we need to be a messenger we need to tell people even if we think they are going to accept it and by the way you never know. I have people many times reach the end of their rope and the most surprising people have turned to me in a time of crisis and ask me what does, your God have to say about this.

Second lesson don’t stop with just giving the message once there may come a time when you should stop. Moses still gave him the message even though he knew they weren’t going to accept it, he gave it to him to pharaoh more than once, he gave it to him over and over and over again and we should to.

There’s one more lesson here, and it’s the one that we are most likely to miss.  What I’m about to say is not fashionable today, as a matter of fact what’s in vogue today is don't offend people, do everything you can to make people feel comfortable about who and where they are, and I think there’s some truth to that. I don’t think we should go around offending people deliberately, but it’s gone so far some will never talk about hell or judgment anymore. When I approach this passage, I’m struck with it again in exodus they pronounced judgment and let me give you one illustration.

In Acts 17 we find Paul is in Athens. Athens was the intellectual center of the ancient world at that time, if you study philosophy you will start with the Greeks, they started studying philosophy and wisdom and they prided themselves on being the intellectuals. It’s interesting that of all the places Paul visited this is one of the few where he did not start a church, I find that very fascinating, but he was in the marketplace and he gets involved in a conversation, he gets called to Mars hill which is just below the Parthenon in Athens. That hill is still there, and it is there he gets to preach to the intellectuals, and I want to pick up what he said. He said he noticed that when he was heading up the hill he passed the little monument to the unknown God, and he starts with that. I want to tell you they had all kinds of gods out there, but he said I want to about that God. The one you called the unknown God, they put an extra plaque up in case they had missed a God among the many they revered. So, they made a monument to an unknown God, and Paul says I’m talking about him, and he starts with that, and he preached and I’m going to pick it up at Acts 17:29.

“Therefore, since we are the offspring of God we ought not to think of the divine nature like gold or silver or stone something shaped by art and man’s devising, 

[By the way he’s standing just below the Parthenon and up there on that bigger hill is the goddess Athena made out of gold and silver and that kind of stuff it’s a direct reference.]

The God you overlooked and now commands all people everywhere to repent because he has appointed a day on which he will judge the world in righteousness by the Man whom he has ordained he has given assurance of this to all by rising him raising him from the dead and when they heard of the resurrection of the dead some marked then others said we will hear you again on this matter and Paul departed from among them”.

What I want you to note is verse 31 because it says he has appointed a day on which he will judge the world in righteousness by the man capital M, meaning Jesus Christ.

What is so fascinating to me about this is that was the intellectual center of the world, now if you’d go preach judgment on in a soup kitchen or among the down and outs, rarely does someone take against it. But when you go to the universities and even hint that God’s is going to judge everyone someday, they don’t like it and you will face opposition.

I simply want to point out in passing that we should sometimes include the message of judgement, it’s not necessary in every message or sermon, but it’s need to be there when the passage directly refers to it, it’s certainly in act 17, so maybe there comes a time when you say look God loves you, Christ died for you, and Christ the Rose from the dead if you trust him you can be forgiven of your sins, it’s the free grace of God, but I have to also tell you if you don’t do that there’s a coming judgment, and that would motivate you to do so one of the things we can learn from exodus is to include at least sometimes the message of judgment but always to give the message of forgiveness and the love of God for his people, who in the end of the day, just wants to set every captive free.