A week has passed since Egypt's water was turned to blood. An eerie calm blankets the country. The Egyptians sit nervously, twiddling their thumbs. Was the blood just a quick and strange phenomenon sent by the gods? perhaps they wondered. What's going on? Meanwhile, Pharaoh calmly waits in his palace. Sure, the blood put him out a bit, but he doesn't have anything to worry about, right? Then it happens. A servant quietly enters Pharaoh's chambers.
"My lord, Pharaoh," he might have said, "you have visitors."
Enter Moses and Aaron. Oh yes, our guys haven't left the picture yet. They're back, and, as we'll soon see, with a vengeance. I can just see Pharaoh roll his eyes as they enter. What do they want now? probably slipped through his mind. If only he knew.
Moses comes in and makes his plea again. "The LORD says, 'Let My people go that they may serve me.' If you don't, another plague will be put upon Egypt." Pharaoh yawns. "Yeah, yeah, I've heard all this before. And the answer's still no." Moses shakes his head. "Alright. We warned you." Then Aaron stretches out his staff over the waters of Egypt, and suddenly a slimy green head pokes out of the water jug. Pharaoh starts a bit. A frog? In his palace? Oh, no Pharaoh. Not a frog. Millions of frogs. And not just in your palace. All over Egypt ...
Yes, frog infestation was indeed Plague #2. Picture this with me: frogs in your bed, frogs in your food, frogs on your furniture, frogs crawling on you, frogs in your clothes, frogs hopping all over your house. Bottom line - frogs everywhere! Not a pretty picture.
Pharaoh is troubled about this now. Is this still some secret art? he probably wondered. Let's get my magicians and see if they can do it. That way I'll know whether Moses and Aaron's power is real or not.
"But the magicians did the same by their secret arts and made frogs come up on the land of Egypt." Exodus 8:7Here we go again. Those nasty magicians did the same thing! But not by the Lord's power, the power which enabled Moses and Aaron. The magicians used "their secret arts," the ESV tells us. The HCSB says they used, "their occult practices." Eugene Peterson translated it, "their incantations" (The Message). The magicians weren't demonstrating real, pure, true power. Satan was working through them to make a copy of God's miracle, not their own miracle. They were simply counterfeiting God's power.
So Pharaoh calls in our guys. He's sick of and a little worried about those frogs, so he tells Moses and Aaron, "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." (Exodus 8:8) Finally! It only took three begs and two plagues! So Moses cries out to the Lord and suddenly every frog disappears! They wished. Actually, every frog died. Big difference. Exodus tells us, "The frogs died out in the houses, the courtyards, and the fields. And they gathered them together in heaps, and the land stank." (Exodus 8:13-14) Could you imagine? As if the live frogs weren't bad enough, now we have towering piles of stinky dead frogs! Well, at least the infestation is over.
Back to Pharaoh. So does he smile over his frogless land and say, "Send the Israelites out," just like he promised? Let's see.
"But when Pharaoh saw that there was a respite, he hardened his heart and would not listen to them, as the LORD had said." (Exodus 8:15)Aw, gee! Just when we thought we were home-free, Pharaoh has to go hardening up his heart like that. Well, at least there's hope. I have to admit, I derive immense comfort from the last part of that verse - "as the LORD had said." Even when things in Egypt seemed to be spinning horribly out-of-control, the Lord already knew exactly what was going to happen. He wasn't sitting up in Heaven biting His fingernails anxiously, wondering nervously whether Pharaoh was going to let His people go or not and heaving a frustrated sigh when the Israelites remained in bondage. My God is totally omniscient; He knows everything. He knew exactly what was going to happen in Egypt 4,000 years ago, and He knows what's going to happen to each and every one of us, today, tomorrow, and for the rest of our lives. When He decrees something is going to happen, it will happen. It may take a plague ... or two ... or ten, but it'll happen.
"God is not a man who lies, or a son of man who changes His mind. Does He speak and not act, or promise and not fulfill?" Numbers 23:19