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Pharaoh’s refusal to listen to his magicians leads to the next plague, swarms of insects. This plague is an attack upon the Egyptian god Khepfi, who was worshiped as the god of insects and dung beetles. The Lord sends this fourth plague upon the land of Egypt.

However, this time God is making a distinction in the land. This plague will not touch the land of Goshen. Goshen was the land in which the Hebrews lived. It was given to them by the Pharaoh whom Joseph served when Jacob and the rest of his sons came to live in Egypt during the famine (Genesis 47:6).

The last three plagues affected all the land of Egypt, including the Hebrews land of Goshen, but this plague shall not. God has always drawn a distinction between the righteous and the wicked. He does this so that we may know He is God. He does this so that we may know that His way is right and good.

We all live in this fallen world, the righteous and the unrighteous. We all, whether believer or non-believer, experience both good and evil. We all deal with the consequences of sin, our sin and the sins of others. Yet there will always come a time when the plumb line is dropped (Zechariah 4:10).

We read in the book of Ezekiel about God’s judgment on Jerusalem. The temple of God had become a place of idol worship. The priests of God were worshipping false gods within the walls of the temple and there were women prostituting themselves at the temple gates. God had finally had enough, but before He brought His judgment, He marked His remnant.

God will continue to spare His righteous ones even until the end of the age. In Revelation 7:3 we read of an angel crying out after the breaking of the sixth seal “saying, ‘Do not harm the earth or the sea or the trees until we have sealed the bond-servants of our God on their foreheads.'” After the breaking of the seventh seal we read in Revelation 9:4 how God protects those who serve Him, those with the seal on their foreheads, and He would not allow the plague of locusts and scorpions to harm them.

In Psalm 37:25 David wrote “I have been young and now I am old, yet I have not seen the righteous forsaken or his descendants begging bread.” My friend, God knows those who are His, and He will not forsake them. He has promised us over and over in His Word that when the righteous cry, He hears and He delivers them out of their trouble in His time and in His way (Psalm 34:17).

Oh precious one, the question that remains is are you His?
Do you wear His mark on your forehead?
Do you sigh and groan over the abominations you see committed around you?
Is your righteous soul oppressed and tormented day after day by the lawless deeds and sensual conduct of unprincipled men (2 Peter 2:7-8)?
Do you wear His seal or are you more the “fellow citizen” we read about in Ezekiel 33…

My friend, we can sit in church every Sunday and sit before the pastor and claim to be a child of God, we can sing our songs of worship with our arms lifted up, but if we refuse to practice what we hear and sing then all we have to look forward to is judgment.

What is even worse, is that with every word, with every song, with every refusal, we harden our hearts. Every opportunity we have to believe and we do not do it, we harden our hearts (Mark 8:16-17, Hebrews 3:15-16).

Perhaps you feel you are offering up to God a good effort, that you have found a good compromise. You are after all there, and maybe you serve in an area, possibly you even tithe regularly. Maybe you feel you can rationalize and excuse your disobedience in other areas of your life by holding up your list of works. Oh precious one, we can see through God’s dealings with Pharaoh that our God just does not accept compromise.

God has sent this fourth plague upon the land of Egypt. He has made a distinction between the land of Goshen where the Hebrews live and the rest of the land of Egypt. God is demonstrating His power and authority once again before Pharaoh. God is giving Pharaoh another opportunity to hear and to be obedient.

Pharaoh offers a compromise up to Moses and tells him that his people can sacrifice to their God in the land of Egypt, but Moses refuses because that is not what the LORD commanded. Pharaoh concedes and says that he will let the people go. However, as soon as Pharaoh experiences the relief of the mercy of God, he once again goes back on his word.

Mercy has hardened him again. He professed to obey God out of the desire for his own comfort. His obedience had nothing to do with surrender from the heart. It was fake. It was for selfish gain, but my friend do not think that this took God, or even Moses, by surprise.

Oh Father,

As I live in this world I am surrounded by both good and evil. This plague of sin is all around me. I fight it from within and without, but I fight to win. I know that you see my heart. I know that you see whether I am oppressed and tormented by my sin and the sin of others or whether I secretly seek it for pleasure and put on a face of hating sin for show. Oh Father, open my eyes to any disobedience that is within me. Purge me of all iniquity. Let me not deal deceitfully with You, with others, or myself. May my heart be pleasing to You.

My Jesus, it is in Your name I pray,
Amen

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Pharaoh’s hardened heart and his refusal to keep his word leads to another plague upon his land. This third plague that the LORD sends upon Egypt, is a plague of gnats or lice. This plague was an attack upon the Egyptian god Geb, worshiped as the god of the earth.

Moses strikes the dust of the earth with his staff and the dust becomes the gnats. We do not know how much time passed between the plague of frogs and this plague of gnats. Quite possibly the plague of gnats from the dust of the earth have come while the piles of frogs are still stinking up the land of Egypt.

I am sure that Pharaoh is slightly annoyed by this point, but I am also sure that he is still smug in his attitude. I can picture him walking arrogantly into his throne room while he struggles to not slap and scratch at the lice covering his body. I can hear him loudly summon his magicians once again, expecting them to diminish his hidden fear.

How arrogant we humans can be when we do not want to be humbled. So many times we would rather struggle in our sin, suffer in our consequences, and sink deeper in our pits than just admit we are wrong. Proverbs 16:5 declares, “Everyone who is proud in heart is an abomination to the LORD; assuredly he will not be unpunished.”

The magicians come and they pull all their tricks out of the bag. They try, but their secret arts cannot bring forth gnats. The magicians look at their Pharaoh and they say, “This is the finger of God.” (Exodus 8:19) God is through playing games. The magicians now realize this.

They now fully understand that the power of trickery and illusion that they held in their hands is no match for the One True Living God. They now understand that they are not dealing with a false god that they have created, that they have given power through their own manipulation, but they now understand that this God is real.

The magicians attempt to convince Pharaoh that he needs to listen to this God. His heart is so hard that he will not hear, and he hardens it further still.

When we see the obvious power of our God and yet refuse to bow to His authority we, like Pharaoh, harden our heart. Oh precious one, how careful we must be. Let us not excuse, rationalize, or dismiss the obvious finger of our God. Let us not chalk unexplained events up to circumstance and coincidence. Their are no coincidences with God. He is sovereign and is at work at all times.

When Jesus gave up His spirit on the cross it is written that the veil in the temple was torn from top to bottom. It is written that the tombs were opened and the dead arose. It is written that the earth quaked and the rocks shook and darkness fell over the land. It is written that when Jesus yielded up His spirit a centurion who was standing at the foot of the cross said, “Truly this man was the Son of God!” (Matthew 27:50-54, Mark 15:33-39) It is also written that after even all of this obvious finger of God upon this moment in history, many still refused to believe.

Religious leaders came and asked for guards to be placed at the tomb because they knew that Jesus had foretold His resurrection. Then, even after the resurrection, when these eyes saw the risen Christ walking and appearing to many, they still attempted to excuse, to rationalize, to dismiss the obvious power of God. And their hearts were hardened. In Luke 16:31 we read “But he said to him, ‘If they do not listen to Moses and the Prophets, they will not be persuaded even if someone rises from the dead.'”

Pharaoh is a man blinded by his own pride. Pharaoh curses and spurns the Lord. He is a man who in the haughtiness of his countenance refuses to seek God or even admit that there is a God besides the god that he himself claims to be (Psalm 10:3-4).

He has seen the evidence of the existence of the God of the Hebrews, yet denies Him still. He has seen the signs of the power of this God, yet still refuses to acknowledge Him as God. He has even experienced the mercy of this God, yet still refuses to give Him praise. Oh how stubborn we in our pride can be.

Oh Father,

Your Word says that “Pride goes before destruction, and a haughty spirit before stumbling.” (Proverbs 16:18) How easily I can find myself stumbling in my pride. It was pride that led to the fall of man. It is pride that can keep us from ever getting up from that fall. Oh how the arrogance of our heart can deceive us (Obadiah 1:3). Father, forgive me for the times that I have let pride overtake me. My God, may I always be quick to recognize your power and your work in my life. May I always give You all the glory and praise.

My Jesus, it is in Your name I pray,
Amen