Exiting Egypt Chapter 10B P1

Exiting Egypt

“The Ninth Plague – A Felt Darkness”

Exodus 10:21-29

By Dennis Lee: Chapter 10B P1

God had been patient with the Egyptians for centuries, and the reason is what the Bible tells us that God is longsuffering and is not willing that any perish, but that all come to repentance. But as I said last week, don’t mistake God’s longsuffering with forever suffering because the day is just about to come for Egypt when God brings his last judgment in the form of the tenth plague.

Up to this point, that is, through the last eight plagues, God warned Pharaoh and the Egyptians of the judgment that was going to come, that is in all but two of the cases, which is what we see here in the ninth plague. In every plague that God had sent, Pharaoh had rejected God’s demand to let the Jews go free. And so, since they had live in spiritual darkness for all this time, God was going to send their way in the form of this ninth plague, physical darkness.

Read Ex. 10:21-29

Now, some may say, God didn’t give Pharaoh a chance to repent before this plague, but that is simply not true. He gave Pharaoh eight chances prior, and in the case of the last two, Pharaoh reneged on his promise. And so, Pharaoh had to know that another plague was coming.

You might say that this was a contest of wills. Who will outlast the other? Will Pharaoh’s will win out over God’s, or was God’s will going to prevail and Pharaoh repent and then do what God had said.

And so God told Moses to stretch out his hand toward the sky and a thick darkness spread over Egypt for three days and nights, darkness so dark and ominous that it could be felt.

It’s kind of like fate, just as they had kept the Israelites in chains of slavery, so now God was keeping them in chains of darkness. It says that the people were literally imprisoned in their homes. It says that the darkness was so thick that they couldn’t see one another, and so thick was the darkness that they were afraid to even leave their beds. Not even a lit lantern, candle, or fire could break through the darkness.