...no vacations from the Lord...

The Third Plague: Gnats

16 Then the Lord said to Moses, ‘Say to Aaron, “Stretch out your staff and strike the dust of the earth, so that it may become gnats throughout the whole land of Egypt.”’ 17 And they did so; Aaron stretched out his hand with his staff and struck the dust of the earth, and gnats came on humans and animals alike; all the dust of the earth turned into gnats throughout the whole land of Egypt. 18 The magicians tried to produce gnats by their secret arts, but they could not. There were gnats on both humans and animals. 19 And the magicians said to Pharaoh, ‘This is the finger of God!’ But Pharaoh’s heart was hardened, and he would not listen to them, just as the Lord had said.

The Fourth Plague: Flies

20 Then the Lord said to Moses, ‘Rise early in the morning and present yourself before Pharaoh, as he goes out to the water, and say to him, “Thus says the Lord: Let my people go, so that they may worship me. 21 For if you will not let my people go, I will send swarms of flies on you, your officials, and your people, and into your houses; and the houses of the Egyptians shall be filled with swarms of flies; so also the land where they live. 22 But on that day I will set apart the land of Goshen, where my people live, so that no swarms of flies shall be there, that you may know that I the Lord am in this land. 23 Thus I will make a distinction[e] between my people and your people. This sign shall appear tomorrow.”’ 24 The Lord did so, and great swarms of flies came into the house of Pharaoh and into his officials’ houses; in all of Egypt the land was ruined because of the flies.

25 Then Pharaoh summoned Moses and Aaron, and said, ‘Go, sacrifice to your God within the land.’ 26 But Moses said, ‘It would not be right to do so; for the sacrifices that we offer to the Lord our God are offensive to the Egyptians. If we offer in the sight of the Egyptians sacrifices that are offensive to them, will they not stone us? 27 We must go a three days’ journey into the wilderness and sacrifice to the Lord our God as he commands us.’ 28 So Pharaoh said, ‘I will let you go to sacrifice to the Lord your God in the wilderness, provided you do not go very far away. Pray for me.’ 29 Then Moses said, ‘As soon as I leave you, I will pray to the Lord that the swarms of flies may depart tomorrow from Pharaoh, from his officials, and from his people; only do not let Pharaoh again deal falsely by not letting the people go to sacrifice to the Lord.’

30 So Moses went out from Pharaoh and prayed to the Lord. 31 And the Lord did as Moses asked: he removed the swarms of flies from Pharaoh, from his officials, and from his people; not one remained. 32 But Pharaoh hardened his heart this time also, and would not let the people go” Exodus 8:16-30.

In some ways the third plague of gnats is like the plague of the frogs that preceded it: both involve the miraculous production of a massive superabundance of an animal, with the effect of annoying and disturbing the Egyptians but without serious devastation otherwise. Likewise, this plague was caused by striking something with the staff of God in Aaron's hand—previously water, this time the ground, so that God's sovereignty over “land and sea”61 was clearly evidenced. And, again, the magicians set out to duplicate this plague as well. What is notably different about the third plague is the failure of the magicians. 

But in the fourth plague, the swarms of flies, Moses issues a warning to Pharaoh as in the case of the second plague. But a special emphasis in this plague account is not mentioned in any of the earlier ones: the differences  between what happened to the Egyptians and what happened to the Israelites. Such differences are implicit in the earlier plagues as well, but at this point Moses chose to make it explicit. 

Another important feature of this fourth plague account is Pharaoh's partial bending to Moses' demands: in v. 25 Pharaoh expressed willingness to let the Israelites have a special religious holiday as long as they held it within the land of Egypt; and in v. 28 he went so far as to authorize a brief departure from the land into the wilderness—on which he subsequently reneged (v. 32). These brief and partial concessions suggest the first cracks in the stone of the official Egyptian government resistance, demonstrating that the plagues were beginning to affect the king's resolve. Moses' account does not differentiate between the most likely causes for Pharaoh's wavering, the growing intensity of the plagues and their over-all cumulative effect. I suspect that both causes worked to influence Pharaoh's decision toward compromise. 

But when the flies come, this is the point at which Pharaoh begins to weaken, and so he called Moses and Aaron to the palace and offered the Israelites a partial deal to their God's demands. But Moses knew that God's promise to Israel was “to rescue them from the hand of the Egyptians and to bring them up out of that land into a good and spacious land, a land flowing with milk and honey.” So what I notice the most in the negotiations in this plague is that, by this time, it should be obvious to us all that one of the things that Yahweh accomplished by making Pharaoh's heart hard (i.e., making him stubborn) was to cause Pharaoh to become someone whose word simply could not be trusted.

Dear friends, this is what we sometimes do with the Lord when we routinely step away from following Him! We are tempted to “negotiate’ with the Lord in our minds, finding ways to talk ourselves into living our life with built-in vacations from God!  Satan knows this and so tempts us to talk ourselves into taking a “Spring Break” away from the Lord.

When you know — or feel — you are being tempted, step away immediately and talk to the Lord. Ask Him for a way to return to Him. Pharaoh never did this. Don’t you do the same! 

Lord Jesus Christ, Son of the Living God, have mercy on me a sinner.