The LORD in His great patience and mercy, again assures Moses and Aaron that He is in control and Pharaoh would recognise God through Moses even though Pharaoh previously showed he didn’t believe in nor accept the God of Israel. What a privilege to stand in the place of God to an unbelieving world! Paul said the same in writing to the Corinthians (2 Corinthians 3:2,3).
We might be the only servant of God that people will see, and the only letter from God they will read. ‘We are living epistles known and read of all men’.
Despite the failures of the past Moses is told to go again and stand before Pharaoh as God and Aaron would be his mouthpiece, his prophet. Prophets only spoke what God told them, and Aaron was no different. God would tell Moses the message and Moses would tell Aaron to speak it.
Why did God have to say the next sentence? “And I will harden Pharaoh’s heart”. He already displayed a hard heart, surely it needed to be softened. But God added – “….and multiply My signs and My wonders in the land of Egypt.”
God would deal with Pharaoh in His own way. In verses 4-7 He explains – “…. And the Egyptians shall know that I am the LORD….”
And verse 7 reminds us that Moses was 80 years old and Aaron 83 years old when they went before Pharaoh. No youngsters and an incentive to us that age is no barrier for God to use us.
The LORD told Moses and Aaron that they were to show a miracle when they appeared before Pharaoh, and he would ask for one. Moses told Aaron to throw his rod on the ground and it would become a serpent, and it did (v8-10). In chapter 4 Moses had done this before the people now it was for Pharaoh’s benefit. Pharaoh was not going to be beaten so he called his wise men and magicians and they threw their rods down and they became serpents (v11-13). However, Aaron’s rod swallowed up their serpents. One would have thought this would impress Pharaoh, but it made him harden his heart as The LORD had said he would. Pharaoh ignored a clear message from God that God was greater than his cleverest magicians.
Satan is able to perform magic tricks by demonic power. The apostle Paul tells us in 2 Thessalonians 2:9,10) that in the last days, “The coming of the lawless one is according to the working of Satan, with all power, signs, and lying wonders, and with all unrighteous deception among those who perish, because they did not receive the love of the truth, that they may be saved.” These are not miracles as such, they can be supernatural, but they are contrived by Satan to deceive people. Many have said that if they could see a miracle they would believe, but Jesus said that they were blessed if they had not seen but had believed.
We have recorded the miracle of the resurrection of Jesus, what greater miracle do we need. If we have believed and been saved from our sin, that is a miracle. We could not save ourselves.
The LORD told Moses that Pharaoh’s heart was hard, and he wouldn’t let them go, so he was to go to Pharaoh next morning to warn Pharaoh what was coming. Moses was to go meet Pharaoh by the river and take his rod and strike the water and it would turn to blood, the fish would die, the river stink and the Egyptians hate to drink the water. He was instructed to tell Pharaoh that this was how he would know that God is The LORD (v14-18).
This was the first plague sent by God because of Pharaoh and God was merciful in giving him warning, but it didn’t change Pharaoh’s hardened heart. After the warning, The LORD told Moses, verses 19-21, to tell Aaron to take his rod and stretch out his hand before Pharaoh, over the waters of Egypt, the streams, the rivers, the ponds and the pools of water and they would become blood. There would be blood in the buckets and pitchers so the people could not drink of it.
There were nine plagues grouped in threes. It appeared that there were warnings as well as a call to repentance before the first two in each group but not before the third. Each plague was connected to an Egyptian deity displaying that The LORD is greater than any other.
The river Nile was considered a god by them, but God show He was greater than the Nile god. They had three gods connected to the Nile river, Khnum was considered to be the guardian of the river, Hapi, the spirit of the river and Osiris the Nile as his bloodstream which was significant in this plague. All three were powerless against the One True God.
Pharaoh’s magicians (v22-25) did not help the situation because they also turned water into blood when one would have thought that they should have turned the blood back into clear water. Thus, Pharaoh was not impressed by The LORD God and remained unmoved. Seven days passed after this, and God spoke again.
