Exodus chapter 8, verses 1 to 19. This morning, we're all going to witness. And I like to think of it that way. We're not just reading about, but with the eyes of faith, we're all going to witness, as it were, with our own eyes. the second two plagues, or the last two plagues in this first set of three. Remember, they're sets of three. We'll look at the last two in this first set. So, let's just pray together. Our Heavenly Father, we pray now that You would open our eyes, that we would be able to witness Your mighty deeds in history. and be filled up with faith today to live our lives in obedience and love to You. In Jesus' name, Amen. 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, not you Pharaoh, but me. But if you refuse to let them go, behold, I will plague, or we could say, I will smite all your country with frogs." I would assume that when we read those verses, the first question we may ask is, Frogs, right? That's kind of how I felt when I first read it. Why frogs? It seems a strange choice for the second plague. Frogs are harmless, except for the poisonous variety. But I don't believe that these were the poisonous variety. Frogs are harmless. They don't bite. They don't sting. They don't attack or destroy. They don't eat the crops. If you see a frog, you just go pick it up. Right? And yet, if Pharaoh will not let Yahweh's people go, then he will strike all of Pharaoh's country with frogs. Remember that last week we were introduced to the Egyptian god of the Nile, Hapi. Well, another god of the Egyptians was named Khnum. And this God was originally said to be the God of the source of the Nile River. Now they didn't know where the source of the Nile River was. I think they believed it was somewhere in the heavens or something. Remember now how the Nile would flood its banks every year. since the annual flooding of the Nile brought with it silt and clay, river sediment, which fertilized the land, and its water brought life to its surroundings, well then Canaum, the god of the source of the Nile, was thought to be the creator of the bodies of human children, which he made at a potter's wheel from clay. and placed in their mother's wombs. But of course, what are bodies without breath, without life? And so one of the things that accompanied the annual flooding of the Nile River was a mass proliferation of frogs. And so frogs came to be associated with fertility. You see how it's all going together, right? You have the Nile flooding its banks and depositing silt and river sediment, fertilizing the land. The Nile then waters the land, giving it life. And then along with that flooding of the Nile comes a mass proliferation annually. And we're going to talk later about people who suggest that this is all a natural progression. It's not what it is. The scriptures are clear. But connected with this was the mass proliferation of frogs. And so these frogs came to be associated with fertility, with the ability to produce healthy and abundant offspring. As a result, we end up not only with Canoom, the god of the source of the Nile, but with his wife, Heket. who now represents this power to reproduce and have many healthy children. We can put up a slide. Hecate is pictured often as a human female with a frog's head, and sometimes in other ways to symbolize connection with fertility. So in Egyptian mythology, it's this frog goddess Hecate, who was married to Canoom and she would breathe life into the bodies that her husband had formed from the clay on his potter's wheel. So here, I bring up the next slide. And here's a picture of Canoom forming the bodies on his potter's wheel. And here is Saket with the head of a frog involved in this process in bringing life to these bodies. Fertility and life Hecate ended up being associated with rebirth and even this idea of resurrection. Hecate, the frog goddess, was especially associated with the final stages of childbirth. And so she was given the title, She Who Hastens Birth. Some claim in your handout that Egyptian midwives often called themselves the servants of Hecate and that her priestesses were trained in midwifery. Women often wore amulets of her during childbirth, which depicted Hecate as a frog sitting in a lotus. Okay, so I want you to get the picture. I don't like to spend a lot of time talking about pagan gods on Sunday morning. But I do want us to get the picture that in that culture and in that day, the frog wasn't just some out there idea. It was a part of life in Egypt. Heket was intimately connected with the Nile River and represented vividly the powers of fertility and childbirth. That, you know, if you think about it, even from a Christian perspective, that's an amazing thing that we can have babies. That's something, a gift that God blessed humankind with in the beginning, be fruitful and multiply. That's a blessing from Him. So, now in light of all this, we ask the question again, why frogs? Why smite all of Pharaoh's country with frogs? Now Pharaoh goes on. Moses goes on to describe for Pharaoh exactly what this plague of frogs is going to look like. So, verses 3-4, The Nile shall swarm with frogs that shall come up into your house and into your bedroom and on your bed and into the houses of your servants and your people and into your ovens and your kneading bowls. On you and on your people and on all your servants shall the frogs come up. We might think of a lot of frogs. I mean, I know a few frogs, no big deal. A lot of frogs could be an annoyance, right? Maybe even a major annoyance. But what do we mean by a lot of frogs? So this isn't your normal annual proliferation of frogs here. These frogs are swarming, it says. And they are swarming Everywhere! So, people in Egypt did not have raised beds. Even today, in many countries, you don't sleep on raised beds, you sleep on a mat on the floor. They didn't have high countertops. We assume all sorts of things. Even today in many countries, you cook your meals on the ground, right? So they didn't have the high countertops. Neither did they have or normally need entrances, doors for the entrances to their houses. So their houses weren't all sealed up like ours are in our climate and in our day of wealth. So therefore, when you laid down on your bed at night, you laid down with frogs. And if you rolled over, you rolled over on frogs. And when you were kneading the dough for bread, there were frogs in your dough. And then there were frogs in the clay ovens when it was time to bake the bread. When you walked, you could hardly avoid stepping on frogs. Everywhere you went, and you just begin to imagine, affecting every part of life from the bathroom to the kitchen to whatever your workplace might be, there were frogs. I think it's safe to call this, maybe not just a major annoyance, I'll still call it an annoyance because you weren't going to die, but let's call it an unbearable annoyance. And maybe when something's unbearable, we'd rather call it something other than an annoyance. So what does it mean when the land and the people of Egypt are overrun with frogs from the Nile? Well, it means that that which symbolizes for the Egyptians the gift and the blessing of fertility has now been turned into a curse. In essence, Fertility itself, which, I mean, every ancient nation, and perhaps even modern ones, had gods representing fertility. Because you needed to reproduce, you needed your crops to grow, you needed your vegetable gardens to grow, and you needed your livestock to produce, your sheep to produce, and you needed to bring forth children. So fertility was a huge deal. But suddenly, fertility, the essence of fertility for the Egyptians, represented by the frog goddess Aket, has become a curse and a plague on all the land of Egypt. Now still though, why? Why should that be? When we come to the plague of gnats in just a few minutes, we're gonna explore this idea a little more. So keep all that in your mind. For right now, we need to see that another main point of these verses, not a point we find and create, but a point God is making in these verses, is that this plague will personally affect Pharaoh. See, when the Nile River was turned into blood, what did Pharaoh do? It says in 723 that he turned and went into his house. and didn't take it to heart. See, he could go and insulate himself from it and send all his servants and slaves out to dig the holes and bring him the water. What did Pharaoh care? It didn't touch him. But with the plague of frogs, he can't very well go into his house and try to pretend it doesn't exist. Listen again to what the Lord told Moses to tell Pharaoh. The Nile shall swarm with frogs that shall come up into your house, singular, and into your singular bedroom, and on your singular bed, on the Pharaoh's bed. Isn't royalty supposed to be exempt from nuisances like this? and into the houses of your servants and your people and into your ovens and into your kneading bowls. And then it says literally in Hebrew, on you and on your people and on all your servants shall the frogs come up. Now the normal word order in Hebrew is verb, subject, object. We put subject, verb, object. I hit the ball, I remember that. They would say, hit, verb, subject, object, yes, hit I the ball. Hit I the ball, but here it says, the ball I hit. Okay, so this is very unique in the Hebrew. Here it's emphasizing, as one commentator says, on you, the object, will come up frogs. On you, to emphasize that the frogs will even climb up onto Pharaoh's royal person. Pharaoh's used to being insulated and protected from the things that commonly troubled everyone else. He's used to being treated as a god. We'll see that more as we go along. He was no mere mortal, this Pharaoh, and everyone around him treated him accordingly. But here in these verses, the only true God makes it abundantly, if not comically clear, that there is no respect of persons with Him. I was impacted recently by what Elihu said to Job, Behold, I am toward God as you are. I too was pinched off from a piece of clay. Proverbs 22 says, The rich and the poor meet together. The Lord is the maker of them all. And then again, Elihu says, The one who is righteous and mighty says to a king, Like Pharaoh, worthless one, and to nobles, wicked man, he shows no partiality to princes, nor regards the rich more than the poor, for they are all the work of his hands. So we read this story and we see Pharaoh and somehow we might even still be thinking of him as something special. But in God's eyes, he's no different from the lowest born slave who does his bidding. And so the pharaoh will climb up, the frogs will climb up even onto his royal person. And your handout. Because God has cut out every single human being from the same common lump of clay. There obviously can't be any one of us who in God's eyes is any better than or different than or more than anyone else. Perhaps the fundamental truth that we all say and maybe confess with our mouths. But I wonder how often we instinctively, and if it's instinctive, that means we don't even think about it. It's unconscious, but yet we're responsible. How often do we view ourselves in some just subtle way? as somehow better than or superior to any other human being on the face of the earth. Now stating it like that, can any one of us say we've ever, we've been exempt from that kind of thinking? How often are we even just unconsciously inclined to court the favor of those who are more wealthy or those who are more influential? Those who look more like they have their act together? Those who look like your typical Christian family, whatever that is? How often are we tempted to court the favor of those more so than the poor and the socially insignificant? Will we all welcome with complete and total impartiality? And I believe that's something only God can produce in us. Anyone at all who walks through our doors on a Sunday morning, because, because we are deeply aware of this fact that we have all been pinched from the same common lump of clay. And all been made in the same way in the image of God. Of course, one thing all of this means, as well, is that in the end, there's no one, no matter how wealthy or how influential or how immune they are in this life from the things that come to everyone else, there's no one who can ever escape or who will ever be exempted from God's righteous judgment, Moses says in Deuteronomy. The Lord your God is God of gods and Lord of lords, the great, the mighty, and the awesome God who therefore is not partial and takes no bribe. The point of this verse in Exodus 8 is that Pharaoh, who, I guarantee if you lived back then and you lived in Egypt, you'd look at Pharaoh as, wow. But God wanted his people to see that in his eyes, Pharaoh stood before him no less vulnerable and no less exposed than the lowest born slave in all of Egypt. This was a sign not only to Pharaoh, but a sign to God's people, a comfort to them, that the one who exercised apparently so much control over them was in God's eyes worthless. To use the words of one of the passages we just read. In the eyes of Yahweh there is no difference at all. Therefore the frogs that come up on Pharaoh's servants will also come up on the royal person of Pharaoh himself. And so in your handout, this strengthens and it encourages us as well. In a world where it's the wealthy and the influential and the great ones who are often the ones who persecute and attack God's children. But then as we think about God's impartiality, we're also exhorted In the words of Peter, if you call on Him as Father, who judges impartially, your background doesn't matter, your social status doesn't matter, your achievements don't matter, your wealth doesn't matter, your looks don't matter, there is nothing about you that matters when it comes to the judgment, except for our obedience of faith. So therefore, if we call on Him as Father who judges impartially according to each one's deeds, conduct yourselves with fear throughout the time of your exile, knowing that it wasn't of you, but that you were ransomed from the feudal ways inherited from your forefathers, not with perishable things such as silver or gold, but with the precious blood of Christ. like that of a lamb without blemish or spot. God has told Moses what to say to Pharaoh. And now that the warning has been given, Moses recounts how God's Word was fulfilled. We read in verses 5-6, And the Lord said to Moses, Say to Aaron, stretch out your hand with your staff over the rivers, over the canals, and over the pools. Language that we just heard in the first plague as well. and make frogs come up on the land of Egypt. So Aaron stretched out his hand over the waters of Egypt and the frogs came up and covered the land of Egypt. Now once again, what's the point? Simple obedience in your handout. Aaron's obedience is described in the language of the command. It is emphasizing that he just did what he was told, that's it. The point isn't to draw attention to Moses and Aaron, but to the God who does these awesome things when all His servant does is just what He said to do. That's it. And again, I thought, if only my obedience, if only our obedience here could be described so simply. God said, and She did. God said and he did. What are the great and mighty things that God might then accomplish through us when we simply take him at his word and live accordingly? When we understand that Moses and Aaron are just ordinary men, we're ready for verse 7. We talked about this a couple of weeks ago. It's just briefly here. The magicians did the same thing, Moses says, by their secret arts and made frogs come up on the land of Egypt. Once again, these are not supposedly ordinary men. What are they? They're magicians. And theirs is not simple, ordinary act of obedience. They're applying their hidden, mysterious secret arts. So again, when you're reading these plagues, we have to make sure, sometimes I think we're a little disappointed that they were able to do that. I think we read it and we say, oh man. But that's, to the contrary. We need to make sure that we see the obvious distinction between the awesome power of God that He works through the simple obedience of his servants, and the very real, but yet this counterfeit mockery, this counterfeit power of the Egyptians, which can only imitate and copy the original. See, there is a fundamental difference between what the magicians do and what God accomplishes through His servants. The one is the genuine original, the authentic real deal. The other is the copy and the counterfeit imitation. Signs and wonders may be false. Miracles in and of themselves never prove anything. So why does God allow these false and deceitful signs? Why did He allow them? It wasn't a surprise. Sometimes God does this in order to confirm the wicked in their unbelief. Because they refused to love the truth and so be saved. As Paul goes on to say in Thessalonians, God sends them a strong delusion so that they may believe what is false, in order that all may be condemned who did not believe the truth, but had pleasure in unrighteousness." And so, in your handout there, because it was God's will that Pharaoh should remain hardened in his own sinful unbelief, God allowed these counterfeit signs and wonders. And that was, of course, all Pharaoh needed to strengthen and to make him even more sure of his stubborn ways and decisions. So the Apostle Paul draws a lesson from this very story of Pharaoh, God's dealings with Pharaoh. He says, So then God has mercy on whomever He wills. And He hardens whomever He wills. Since then, we are those who have received mercy. Shouldn't we be filled every day with thanksgiving? God did not give to Pharaoh his sinful rebellion, but God ordained that sinful rebellion, and in the end, it was His will that Pharaoh should be hardened in it. God shows mercy to whom He will show mercy, and hardens whom He will, and is just in all His ways. But I think there's another reason that God allows these false and deceitful signs. I believe God allowed the miracles of Pharaoh's magicians so that he might expose them to his people for what they really are, and that is empty, deceitful counterfeits. So now when we read the passage and we come to it saying, and Pharaoh's magicians did the same by their secret arts, we kind of laugh. We laugh at that and we say, look at that cheap imitation. When the real power, we see where it is. God is revealing in this the distinction between the real thing and the counterfeit. At the same time as He hardens Pharaoh in his sinful unbelief. As the Apostle Paul says in Romans 15, whatever was written in former days was written for our instruction. That through endurance and through the encouragement of the Scriptures, We might have hope. Who does true power belong to, brothers and sisters? Who alone has true power? God. There are other powers in this world, but they are all counterfeit. They are all mockeries, imitations, and copies of the one real power. Exodus chapter 8 verse 8. Then Pharaoh called Moses and Aaron and said, Plead with the Lord to take away the frogs from me and from my people, and I will let the people go to sacrifice to the Lord. And so finally it becomes evident what we've all been thinking, right? Why in the world do Pharaoh's magicians keep on adding to the plagues? If they're really so powerful, they ought to be reversing the plagues that God has been putting upon Pharaoh's people. So, Pharaoh's magicians make the plagues worse by turning even more of Egypt's water into blood and bringing up even more frogs on the land of Egypt. But for some reason, they can't turn the blood back into water. or make the frogs go back into the Nile. And that is because their powers are only allowed to them to the extent that God decides. This encourages us that when we see the world seemingly unfettered and unbounded in its disregard of God, they are not unfettered. And God has only given as much freedom as it has pleased Him to give. The only thing the magicians can accomplish by their secret arts is to, in your handout, confirm and establish the plagues of Yahweh. Only adding to the woes of their own people. This is why Pharaoh doesn't go to his magicians and say, please take the frogs away. He goes to Moses. And so he who sits in the heavens laughs. at the futility of these imitations. In your handout, even the supernatural, miraculous powers of the enemy of God's people can in the end only serve His own sovereign purposes. Why did God allow the magicians to duplicate what His servants did? Because it suited His purposes. What assurance and what comfort and what strength, again, as we begin to grasp the God that we serve. So now the Pharaoh who first said to Moses and Aaron, who is Yahweh? I do not know Yahweh. Now he is forced to say to Moses and Aaron, plead with Yahweh. to take away the frogs from me and from my people and I will let the people go to sacrifice to Yahweh. Verses 9 to 11, Moses said to Pharaoh, And this just knocks your socks right off. That's perfect expression for this right here. Moses said to Pharaoh, be pleased to command me when I am to plead for you and for your servants and for your people that the frogs be cut off from you and your houses and be left only in the Nile. Would I have said that? I'm not so sure. Would you have said that? Because God didn't tell Moses to say that. God didn't say, and Moses, whatever you say, I'll go along with it. He didn't give him that, and we've heard nothing of this. And Pharaoh said, by tomorrow, I want all these millions of frogs gone by tomorrow. Whew, Moses said. Well, he didn't do the whew part, right? He just responded, I did that, but Moses responded, be it as you say. So that you may, and here's the secret, here's the key. This is what made Moses say such crazy things. So that you may know that there is no one like Yahweh our God. The frogs shall go away from you and your houses and your servants and your people. They shall be left only in the Nile. This sounds like a guy who believes what he's saying. Can you see here the change that God has worked in Moses? Did you see this? I mean, for how many weeks did you get kind of tired of hearing about Moses and his failure to get the lesson that God was repeatedly beating him over the head with? Moses is not content simply to go out and pray that the Lord removes the frogs. He's just not content to do that. He wants Pharaoh to name the time for the frogs to be removed. God did not tell Moses to do that. And we know that because what does Pharaoh do when he's done? He goes out and prays like crazy. That's what the word is. When it says he cried out, it's a word expressing earnest crying out and praying. God did not tell Moses to do this, but the reality is that Moses is finally coming now to share. in Yahweh's own zeal and passion for His glory. Moses is finally sharing in that. So, when Pharaoh names the unreasonable time of tomorrow, for all the millions of frogs in Egypt to be cut off and left only in the Nile, Moses doesn't flinch, he doesn't hesitate, he doesn't miss a beat. Be it as you say, so that you may know, there is no one like Yahweh our God. For how long in the first six chapters of Exodus did Moses seem to be aware only of himself? What happened? God changed him. And now we see how his growing awareness of the worthiness and the greatness of Yahweh, what is it produced in him? an unbelievable, and I say that sincerely, an unbelievable fearless boldness that he never had before, clearly. Moses' challenge to Pharaoh is not presumptuous because rather than being self-seeking or self-serving, it flows. His challenge just comes from the fact that Moses was passionate for his God and for the display of his incomparable greatness. The more aware that we are, the more aware that I am of the worthiness and greatness of Yahweh. The more fearless boldness each one of us here in this room will have in our witnessing, in our standing for righteousness when it's unpopular, in our times of suffering, and really in every possible circumstance of life. So we need God to change each one of us as He changed Moses. Verses 12 to 13. So Moses and Aaron went out from Pharaoh. And Moses cried to the Lord about the frogs as he had agreed with Pharaoh. And the Lord did according to the word of Moses. Once again, we can see that Moses is not being presumptuous because he went out from Pharaoh and he said, okay, he said tomorrow... No, he went out and cried earnestly to the Lord about the frogs. And I think we can assume he prayed something like this, Oh Lord, please, I beseech, I beg, I plead with you, remove the frogs from the land of Egypt, so that Pharaoh might know that there is no one like you. How often do we pray like that? With that kind of passion, because we pray with that kind of motivation. And then we hear these astonishing words. The Lord did according to the word of Moses. Once again, it's clear that God did not tell Moses to go do that. That was Moses' idea. I have a footnote here. We also realize that Moses was fully aware of God's program. God hasn't sent us to a king with plagues, so it's not like we could pray the same thing. But it doesn't minimize the power of God in the circumstances of our lives. I just have a simple question then. I do wonder, seriously, how many more answers to prayer we would see if our prayers were truly, honestly driven by this Moses-like passion for the display of God's greatness and His glory. there perhaps is revival in the church. There is the answer perhaps to so many prayers that we suggest perhaps are not answered. How many more answers to prayer would we see? And again, we may start thinking, oh, so what do I want? Okay, now how do I pray for that with a passion for God's glory? No, I mean, really, you're passionate for God's glory. That will also affect the things we pray for, and then, therefore, the amount of answers we see. The Lord did according to the word of Moses. And therefore, according to Moses' agreement with Pharaoh, and yet, Pharaoh had never been allowed to dictate how the frogs would be removed, and I have to believe he absolutely did not think of the frogs being removed in this manner. The frogs died out in the houses, the courtyards, and the fields, and they gathered them together in heaps upon heaps, and the land stank. Question. The land stank of what? Dead frogs, right? But key, death. The land stank of death, which reminds us of the first plague when God specifically told Moses to say to Pharaoh, the fish in the Nile shall die and the Nile will stink. And then Moses carefully describes what happened. And the fish in the Nile died and the Nile stank. The Nile stank of what? Stank of death. And now we have rotting heaps upon heaps of frogs, causing the whole land of Egypt to stink. Remember how the river god, Hapi, was connected with fertility and the abundance of the land. Now we remember how the frog goddess, Heket, was associated with fertility and the reproductive powers of the Egyptian people. And now, can you see how in these first two plagues, God, the sovereign, almighty God, Yahweh, He takes the very things that were most associated in Egyptian life and culture and religion with life and fertility and abundance and turns them into stinking, rotting, ominous reminders of death. Death is coming. And here is the warning. There seems to be a, only, oh, before that, only it's interesting, that in the second plague, oh, watch this, before God overwhelmed the Egyptians with the stink of death, before He did that, He overwhelmed them with life and fertility, with unbearable swarms of frogs. There seems to be a theme running through this first set of three plagues, but we've only done two. Will it continue in the third? I believe it does. So, verses 15 to 17. But when Pharaoh saw that there was a respite, he hardened his heart and would not listen to them. What a lesson there for us. We'll talk about that in coming weeks. But he would not listen to them as the Lord had said. Then the Lord said to Moses, say to Aaron, now here in this third plague, remember there's no warning for Pharaoh and it's very short and it just happens. He said, say to Aaron, stretch out your staff and strike the dust of the earth so that it may become, everyone seems to think, stinging gnats, perhaps mosquitoes in all the land of Egypt. And they did so. Aaron stretched out his hand with his staff and struck the dust of the earth and there were gnats on man and beast. All the dust of the earth became gnats in all the land of Egypt. I think the main thing for us to realize is they weren't those little gnats like we think of gnats. It was in the gnat family. This time there's no connection with any specific God, Egyptian God. But the one thing that especially catches our attention is what God tells Moses to tell Aaron to do. Now in the next plague, or no, in a couple of plagues from now, we're going to see God tell them to take soot from a kiln and throw it into the air. So it becomes clear that in some of these areas there's a symbolism, there's a specific reason that God told him to do what he did to bring about the plague. In this situation, God tells Moses to tell Aaron to stretch out your staff and strike the dust of the earth. Aaron stretched out his hand with his staff and struck the dust of the earth and all the dust of the earth became gnats in all the land of Egypt. We might not have made much of that except for the obvious theme of fertility and abundance that we've already seen in these first two plagues. So let's go back. When God caused the symbol of fertility in Egypt, what's the symbol of fertility? Frogs. To reproduce. Until it became an unbearable annoyance, even a curse. He described this in terms of causing the Nile to swarm with frogs. That is a very rare word in the Old Testament. In Genesis chapter 9, the Lord said to Noah after he came off the ark, And you, be fruitful and multiply. Swarm. It's the same word. swarm on the earth and multiply in it. Even here in Exodus there is only one other time in the entire book when we find this word swarm and that's in chapter 1. Genesis 9 we see the creation blessing of swarming and Exodus 1 we see the covenant blessing. of swarming. But the people of Israel were fruitful and swarmed. They multiplied and grew exceedingly strong so that the land was filled with them. In a different Pharaoh, in a different Pharaoh's attempt to counteract all this fertility and swarming of the Israelites, which was creation and covenant blessing. This other pharaoh had commanded that all their baby boys be thrown into the Nile River. And now out of this same Nile River, it is the frog, the Egyptian symbol of fertility that swarms across all the land of Egypt until what? The land was covered with them. Even as we saw in Exodus 1, the land was filled with them, the Israelites. And Pharaoh begged that they be taken away. And just as Pharaoh begs that the fertile, swarming frogs be taken away, so one day, if he's not careful, he won't only beg, he will order them out, the Israelites, out of his land. In light of all this, it hardly seems insignificant that in the last plague, in this first set of three, we hear Aaron being told to strike the dust of the earth, we see him then striking the dust of the earth, and then we learn that all the dust of the earth became stinging gnats in all the land of Egypt. As the Israelites were listening to Moses tell the story of this third plague, how could they have missed this last connection with the theme of fertility and blessing. The Lord said to Abraham, I will make your offspring as the dust of the earth, so that if one can count the dust of the earth, your offspring also can be counted. 36 And to Isaac the LORD said, Your offspring shall be like the dust of the earth, and you shall spread abroad to the west, and to the east, and to the north, and to the south. 37 See the other Pharaoh said, The Israelites are too many, let's throw their baby boys into the Nile. 38 This Pharaoh says, The Israelites are many, and he brags about it. And so I will exploit their fertility and their abundance to my own advantage. Therefore, God will plague Pharaoh with fertility, with swarms of frogs, and he will overwhelm him with the dust of the earth. Verses 18 and 19. The magicians tried by their secret art to produce gnats, but they could not, because God's made his point with the magicians, now he's finished with the magicians. So there were gnats on man and beast. Then the magicians said to Pharaoh, this is the finger of God, they do not say Yahweh, we don't know really what they're confessing, except for the fact that it's too big for them, But Pharaoh's heart was hardened, and he would not listen to them as the Lord had said. We've drawn a number of lessons throughout the passage as we've read it. But now I just hope that you're sitting back, you know like you do at the end of, like we've talked about going to the theater, you sit there at the end of the play or the drama sometimes and you're just like, oh. And you gotta think about it, and you wanna watch it again. I think that's what's happening here. Because we're seeing our God in His wisdom, in His power, in His sovereignty, displayed in such astonishing ways, that it leaves us, I believe, having witnessed it, going out feeling like, I don't know, like God could conquer the world. And so we see then that the first three plagues are all signs, not only for Pharaoh, but also for the people of Israel, and so also for us. God is sovereign over Egypt's gods. God is sovereign over all that this world worships. God is sovereign over fertility and childbirth. God is sovereign over even the spiritual new birth and regeneration. And so therefore, putting it together again, we see the Nile and its fertility being turned into a stinking reminder of death. We see the frogs swarming so that God overwhelms the Egyptians with fertility, which they were trying to stamp out or exploit. in his people. He had promised they would swarm and they would multiply and Pharaoh was either trying to stamp it out or use it. And then we see the gnats. Now, as many as the dust of the earth overwhelming Pharaoh and his people because God is a God who has made a promise to his people, a promise of blessing, a blessing that would come through the multiplication of their children. So therefore, God, knowing He is sovereign, we see that He is able to keep His promise. One day, I wrote it down in your handout, but again, feel free just to listen. One day, from all the multitudes of the children of Israel, there will come a Savior. And through this Savior, Gentiles will be joined with Israel. And this new kind of Israel where there's Gentiles with Jews will increase greatly and swarm like the dust of the earth. Until one day, there will be a great multitude that no one can number. from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and languages, standing before the throne and before the Lamb and crying out with a loud voice. Even as we'll see in Exodus 15, the Israelites first cried out when they made it across the sea and the Egyptians were drowned. This so too, this multitude beyond count will cry out with a loud voice, salvation belongs to our God who sits on the throne and to the Lamb. He who sits on the throne will shelter them with his presence as we will see God doing with Israel in the wilderness and in the desert. They shall hunger no more, neither thirst any more. The sun shall not strike them, nor any scorching heat. For the Lamb in the midst of the throne will be their shepherd, and He will guide them to springs of living water, and God will wipe away every tear from their eyes." Dear Heavenly Father, thank You for feeding us this morning with Your Word. And now we pray that as we've considered not only the truth about You, but the changes that works in us. We pray, O Lord, that You, by Your Spirit, would help us not to go from here and forget what we've heard, forget the God that we have seen and the mighty deeds that we have witnessed, but that we would remember and that You would continue then, as a result, your mighty, miracle-working, gracious work in the hearts of each one of us here. We ask this in Jesus' name. Amen.