Exodus 8-12 Recap | OT Ep 8

In this recap, Austin and Ashley delve into the plagues of Egypt as described in the book of Exodus, exploring the significance of each plague as a judgment against the Egyptian gods and a demonstration of Yahweh's power. The discussion highlights Pharaoh's repeated resistance and the eventual foreshadowing of redemption through the Passover, drawing parallels to the New Testament and the sacrifice of Jesus.
Chart of the Plagues from The Old Testament Handbook - Pg 36 
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1dNnBaqGIY1znJe-a0G63WrXMXB6B_Cn3/view?usp=sharing

Reading Plan - Old Testament in One Year
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1tSmSv3JOd-gCJS6VSFMtu-iv14NZ45_M/view?usp=sharing

Chapters

• 0:00 The First and Second Plagues: Blood and Frogs
• 3:28 The Third and Fourth Plagues: Gnats and Flies
• 4:22 The Fifth and Sixth Plagues: Livestock and Boils
• 5:36 The Seventh Plague: Hail
• 7:36 The Eighth and Ninth Plagues: Locusts and Darkness
• 10:33 The Final Plague: The Death of the Firstborn

Transcript

Hey everyone,

My name is Austin. And my name is Ashley. Welcome to the Clean Slate Podcast. Where we're finding Jesus in the Old Testament.

Welcome back friends. In this episode we will cover the recap for Exodus chapters 8 through 12, which is gonna be covering the plagues that God sends upon Egypt. So remember last week where we left off in chapter seven, Pharaoh was warned by Moses that if Pharaoh didn't let the people of Israel go to worship God, that God would use Moses and Aaron to strike the Nile and every source of water in the land of Egypt so that the water turned into blood. And as we know, Pharaoh didn't let the people go and God used Aaron and Moses to do just as he said.

Now, there are some really good Bible nuggets and Gospel glimpses today, but I think perhaps one of the most interesting things to think about as we read through each of these plagues is that each of them targeted an area of nature that the Egyptians believed to be governed by one of their gods. If you're like me and love a good visual of these kinds of things, in the description we added a chart from our Old Testament handbook that's published by Holman. It's a fantastic resource and it really does a great job of laying this concept out in a grid.

Guys, you can Google this and find so many different Egyptian gods or goddesses for the same thing. Like, doggone, one sun god wasn't enough. You had to have five of them.

Yeah, that is also really interesting to me, Ash. There's a sense in which Yahweh, the creator God and the God of the Bible, was executing judgments on each of these so-called gods one by one.

Essentially, it's showing Pharaoh and his fellow Egyptians that Yahweh is in control. No, that's exactly right. We will see this and a lot more a lot more of that as we get into it today.

So going into chapter 8, which is through the second plague, we see that Moses goes again to Pharaoh and tells him

that if the Israelites aren't released to worship God, that the Lord will send a plague of frogs from out of the Nile into every place in Egypt.

3 says, the Nile shall swarm with frogs that will come up into your houses 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 like God meant everywhere.

Pharaoh again doesn't listen and God tells Aaron to command the plague to start. After God had done this,

Pharaoh came to Moses and said that Moses' people could leave if the frogs could just be removed.

Moses responds and tells Pharaoh, it as you say, so that you may know there is no one like the Lord our God. And Moses asked God to remove the frogs.

It's worth noting here that Pharaoh's court magicians were actually able to duplicate these frogs kind of coming out of nowhere to a certain degree. just keep that as a feather for your cap for a little bit later.

So God does as Moses asked him to and remove the frogs, but Pharaoh changes his mind in the end and decided the people would not be able to leave.

So right here a pattern sets itself up and from here forward, Moses tells Pharaoh that God is going to do X unless Pharaoh lets Israel go, his people go.

Pharaoh from here either doesn't care about the plague that's affecting his people or he does what he did in the case of the frogs where he says he'll let Israel go but then changes his mind.

So moving further into chapter eight, we get to the third plague which is the gnats. So being from the South, if you've lived in the South ever in your life, you can just almost hear that little gnat flying into your ear while you're trying to enjoy a glass of sweet tea or something in the summertime. Or into your tea. Yeah, or into your tea, which is the worst. God uses Aaron again and has him actually turn the dust of the earth into gnats. This time.

And from here on out, Pharaoh's magicians could not duplicate the works that Moses and Aaron were doing.

In fact, in verse 19, the magicians told Pharaoh that this is the finger of God, but Pharaoh would not listen to them.

So then we get into the fourth plague, which is the flies.

At God's command, Moses again tells Pharaoh to let his people go, or there would be a plague this time of flies. Another pattern sets itself up here, The plagues don't affect the land of Goshen where the people of Israel live.

You know, to your point, God says, I will put division between my people and your people. So not only is God controlling the start and stop of these plagues

He's also making it painfully obvious that this is a plague upon Egypt. The Israelites were not affected despite being right in the thick of it.

Yeah, you're right. And further to your point with the next plague in chapter 9, which would be the fifth plague, this is where God strikes the Egyptian livestock.

Pharaoh's warned to let the people of God go, and when he does not, the Lord makes good on his word, and a tremendous amount of livestock and Egypt dies. But again, the Israelite livestock is left unharmed, and this serves to harden Pharaoh's heart again and make him more angry.

So moving further into chapter 9, we get to the sixth plague, which is the plague of boils This time there's no warning to Pharaoh from Moses. God tells Moses and Aaron to throw handfuls of soot into the air.

And as it dissipated, large broke out on everyone in Egypt, including the magicians. The magicians again tried to reason with Pharaoh, but he would not listen.

So if you didn't catch that, it being on the magicians, they can't stop it from happening to them. They're powerless over this thing.

So we get to the seventh plague, which is where God sends Moses to tell Pharaoh that because Pharaoh is still exalting himself, so the definition of exalt is to raise yourself to a higher rank or position or greater power. So he's putting himself over the people of Israel in a way that's not helpful and he won't let the people go. Because of this, God will send a very heavy hailstorm that will kill any man or beast or

that's in the field.

servants at this point have believed Moses when he spoke for God in this way and they went out to get all the livestock into shelter.

They said, hey, Pharaoh, he's a Nut playin'. Aha, get it. Nut was an Egyptian sky goddess. See what I did there?

That has got to be the worst joke I've ever heard in my life. You're welcome.

my gosh, okay.

Wow, Anyway, an important note.

that God tells Pharaoh that by now he could have killed everyone in Egypt if he had chosen to. And I think that's the thing that Pharaoh's not seeing, is that this could be so much worse. And unfortunately for him, it's going to get worse here in just a minute. Pharaoh, again, tells Moses to plead with God to stop the hail and he will let Israel go. Moses tells Pharaoh that he will stretch out his hand and God will stop the hail, but that he knows

that Pharaoh does not fear God. You know, we see later in the Bible, in the book of Hebrews, where it's quoted, there is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of living God, right? That God, if you relate to Him as your Father, and you have forgiveness through Jesus, is a loving and kind Father. But if you relate to Him in a way that is, like Pharaoh is, where you're in rebellion.

you're not fearing him and you're not respecting him and honoring him, then it is a fearful thing to fall into his hands. And Pharaoh, again, changes his mind and does not let the people go.

So moving into chapter 10 now, have the plague of Locusts. So again. Wait, let me guess. Moses warns Pharaoh of something else God is gonna do next if he doesn't let the people go. I thought you'd heard that before, haven't you? We have.

So Pharaoh agrees to let only the men go, but this of course is not what God was requiring.

When Pharaoh had told Moses that this is what he would let him do, and Moses, of course, rejected that, the Bible says that Pharaoh drove them out of his sight.

God brought the plague of locusts on through Moses, and the locusts utterly destroyed all the plants of Egypt.

Pharaoh called Moses back and he told him that he had sinned against God and him and Aaron and asked that God would drive the locusts away and God does. The problem here is it kind of how we've talked about in past episodes about the different types of sorrow. One sorrow being the type of sorrow where you're not really sorry, you just got caught and the other being a God-led sorrow where your heart changes.

The issue here is that that didn't happen. So not long after the locusts were driven into the sea and God to care of the problem for them, Pharaoh again changes his mind and decides to not let the people go.

moving into the ninth plague, this is probably the most bizarre out of the first nine plagues. The Lord, this time with no warning to Pharaoh, told Moses to stretch out his hand toward the heaven and darkness, the Bible says a darkness that would be felt would fall on the land of Egypt.

It was so severe that for three days the people of Egypt had to stay in their homes. Just as a little addendum here, Christ our Savior, after he died for us on the cross, was in the tomb in darkness for three days. So just keep that in mind.

trying to end the darkness told Moses that he would let the people go, but they had to leave their flocks and herds behind. Moses, of course, refuses this because the people had to sacrifice to God. They needed the livestock. So when Moses refused, Pharaoh told him to get away from him and to take care, never to see my face again. For the day that you see my face, you shall die. Moses responded and told Pharaoh that it'll be as he said.

One of, if not the main god of the Egyptians, was Ra, who was the one who provided, or at least they believed, he provided sun and warmth.

or Amon-Rei, or Aten, or Atom, or Horus, or even Thoth. He was the Egyptian moon god.

Yeah, that's right. So here in this plague, Yahweh shows that not even Egypt's mighty Ra holds dominion over Yahweh's power, that being that Yahweh can enforce his will upon the earth. As God said, He is the Lord and there is no other like Him in all the earth.

So just as a reminder, Ashley mentioned that we have a graphic posted that shows which of these gods, lower G gods, that Yahweh, the creator god, was judging with each of these plagues. That's really interesting.

as we end today's recap, we come to chapters 11 and 12, and we come to the most severe of all the plagues while gaining a very clear picture of the gospel. This plague would be where the firstborn would be killed. In order to see the gospel picture, I mentioned we need to understand the two parts of these last two chapters in unison.

Sort of like how a pair of glasses can have a different prescription for each lens, these last two chapters help us see the gospel in different ways. The first of these lenses has to do with the plague itself. God tells Moses that he's going to strike down the firstborn child of every household in all the land of Egypt. You may remember that God said earlier in Exodus that he was going to strike the firstborn of Egypt. Remember, Pharaoh had ordered all of the males born to Israel

to be killed when Moses was a child. We can assume that many, if not most, Israelite boys were killed by the Egyptians for a period of time, perhaps even years. God was going to visit Egypt, and Egypt would bear the punishment for their sins.

The interesting thing here is that all the households in Egypt, even the Israelites, were subject to this judgment. But God provided a way out of this judgment, just like He did when He provided a ram for Abraham and just like He provided a way out of judgment for us by sending Christ to die in our place.

God told Moses that if the people would kill a spotless lamb and mark the doors of their homes with its blood, the destroyer would not come to their home. It would pass over them.

As we look to the New Testament, we see how this event, while necessary in the time of Moses, also served as a big flashing arrow to the Messiah, that promised child that was to come.

Like I said, the lamb had to be killed and its blood spread over the doorposts order that God would pass over the homes of Israelites.

Again, looking to the New Testament in the book of John chapter 1 verse 29, John the Baptist said of Jesus, the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. And we see in Ephesians 1-7 where the Apostle Paul says in him, talking about Christ, we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses according to the riches of his grace. In 1 Corinthians 5 verse 7, Paul says,

that Jesus is our Passover lamb. When you study the events of the crucifixion of our Lord in the gospels, you'll even notice that his crucifixion actually takes place during the Passover festival. God was signaling to everyone that had eyes to see that this is the sacrifice, the final payment for sins of anyone who would call on his Name And I say again, because it's worth saying that God has always provided the means of our salvation.

Like, of course it was during Passover, right? Like, of course it was. You know, I just, love how God weaves the tapestry of history together. And us as a 21st century human, we get to look back and see all the different ways that he points to what would be the complete gospel in Jesus, the all-sufficient sacrifice, that Passover lamb. You know, it's like he's in control or something.

Right, who knew?

second of the lenses that I mentioned has to do with the Passover Festival and the Lord's Supper. So you see, God gives very specific instruction to the Israelites for how they were to remember this event that was about to happen. The Passover Festival was established so that each year it would remind the Jews of how God brought them out of slavery and into the promised land, much like how the Lord's Supper is to remind us Christians

how Jesus shed His blood and had His body broken so that we would no longer be in slavery to sin and one day enter into the joy of our Master.

My favorite part of this side of the lens is in verse 48 where it talks about strangers. So not Israelites, right? Strangers to the land. So if they would keep the Passover, they needed to be circumcised. And while at first glance, this may seem a little graphic, this is the most hopeful passage in the section for us as Gentiles. Paul says in the book of Romans chapter two, verses 28 and 29,

For no one is a Jew who is merely one outwardly, nor is circumcision outward and physical. But a Jew is one inwardly, and circumcision is a matter of the heart, by the spirit, not by the letter. His praise is not from man, but from God.

We are able, not through works on the outside, but through the circumcision of our hard hearts by the Spirit, to be grafted into the covenant family and able to partake in the Lord's Supper.

And with that high note, we're gonna have to bid you guys farewell until next time. May His grace abound to you and to me as we study to find Jesus in the Old Testament.