The Plague of Livestock and Boils

Turn with me in your Bible, if you would, to the ninth chapter of Exodus. Ninth chapter of Exodus. And like last week, we will cover two plagues this week. Next week, we're only going to cover one. Just remember that God could have said, well, plague one was this, and plague two was this, and Plague three was that, and plague four was that, and just kind of rapidly gone through it, just you know, ten quick verses. But he didn't do that, he went into great detail to explain to us what was actually happen.

So Exodus chapter 9, verse number 1 reads as follows: Then the Lord said to Moses, Go to Pharaoh and speak to him. Thus says the Lord, the God of the Hebrews. Let my people go, that they may serve me. For if you refuse to let them go and continue to hold them, behold, the hand of the Lord will come with a very severe pestilence on your livestock, which are in the field. On the horses, on the donkeys, on the camels, on the herds, and on the flocks. But the Lord will make a distinction between the livestock of Israel and the livestock of Egypt.

So that nothing will die of all that belongs to the sons of Israel. And the LORD set a definite time, saying, Tom the LORD will do this thing in the land. So the Lord did this thing on the morrow, and all the livestock of Egypt died. But of the livestock of the sons of Israel, not one died. And Pharaoh sent, and behold, there was not even one of the livestock of Israel dead. But the heart of Pharaoh was hardened, and he did not. Let the people go. Then the LORD said to Moses and Aaron, Take for yourselves handfuls of soot from a kil, and let Moses throw it toward the sky in the sight of Pharaoh.

And it will become fine dust over all the land of Egypt, and will become boil, breaking out with sores on man and beast through all the land of Egypt. So they took soot from Mach and stood before Pharaoh, and Moses threw it toward the sky, and it became boil, breaking out with sores on man and beast. And the magicians could not stand before Moses because of the boils. For the boil were on the magicians as well as on all the Egyptians. And the Lord hardened Pharaoh's heart, and he did not listen to them, just as the Lord had spoken.

To Moses. Let's look first of all at the plague concerning the livestock. And we'll begin by looking at the commission in the plague. This is not the first time this has been spoken.

To Moses. In fact, this is the fourth time, excuse me, the fifth time, once in chapter five, and once in chapter seven, and twice in chapter eight. Moses is told to go to Pharaoh and to speak and to stand and to do something. God gives him specific comm. And it's important for us to understand that what he tells Moses to do, Moses does. You see, a lot of times God tells us to do something and we don't want to do it. And what God tells Moses to do is to go and to confront the sinner. Confront him with the truth.

Tell him about the impending judgment that's going to come his way if he doesn't repent. And Moses would be obedient to that. God has told us, the people of God, that we are to go and tell people about impending judgment upon their souls if they don't repent either. The Bible tells us that we are to preach the word and we are to reprove and to rebuke with all long su and patience. 2 Timothy 4, 2. God commissions his people to speak the truth, and we need to be bold to do that. And Moses was that way.

You know, God owns. His people. And because God owns His people, His people need to honor Him. And that's what God wants to see happen. In the lives of those who had been purchased by Him, God owns us. He purchased us with His blood. And God owns us. And because He owns us, what He has done is He has set us free in order that we might serve Him. You go tell Pharaoh that these are my people and that he is to let them go that they might serve me. And we've said this to you quite often throughout this.

Study of Exodus: that the people of God are designed to serve Him. 1 Peter 2: says that Christ redeemed us, He bore our sins in His body. That we might die to sin and live to righteousness. God purchased us that we would live for Him and that we would serve Him. That's what God wants from his people. So Moses would go to Pharaoh, he would explain this to him, and notice that Moses was very obedient to his God.

He would obey his God. It wasn't like, you know, Lord, I think we've done this enough now. How many more plagues are we going to have to give this guy? Do we have to keep going back to Him? How many times do I have to tell Him that they need to serve you? He's got that already. But God said, You go. This is what you tell them. Repetition is the mother of learning. Just keep telling them the same thing. When we go and confront the sinner, when we go and tell the unbelieving world about Jesus Christ, we tell them the same thing over and over and over again because it's the truth.

And they need to hear the truth. And so that's the commission in the plague. But the second thing I want you to notice is the clemency before the plague.

Look at the mercy of God. He says, you go tell him, this is what I'm going to do, and this is when I'm going to do it. I'm going to do it tomorrow. That's God's grace. He didn't have to give him another day. He gave him another day just to think about it. Now, by now, you'd think that Pharaoh would say, you know, maybe this God of Moses is pretty serious about what he's talking about. But you know what? He didn't budge an inch. He didn't think it was going to happen. But it happened just ex like God said it would.

You know, there are many incidents in our lives that God gives us a tomorrow, but He never tells us about that, does He? The Bible speaks of today, not tomorrow. When you read the New Testament, today is the day of salvation. It doesn't say tomorrow is the day of salvation. It says today is. It doesn't tell us when Jesus Christ is going to come back. We just know He can return at any moment, right? Third thing I want you to notice is the carnage from the plague.

The carnage from the plague. The Bible says in verse number 6, all the livestock of Egypt died. Now think about that. All the livestock of Egypt died. Remember the frog plague? And all these frogs came? Then all the frogs died. And they had to pile up all these frogs, get rid of them some way, somehow, and the smell because of all those frogs. Now, think of it this way: now you got cows on the side of the road, now you got camels on the side of the road. Now you have cattle. Now you have sheep. You got them all over the place.

It was just a horrendous smell. And the interesting thing about this plague is that it didn't have to be stopped by Moses. Or by God. Moses didn't have to appeal to God, okay, God, you can stop killing the livestock now.

No, the plague was over when all the livestock died. There was no livestock left to kill, they're all dead. See? Remember back in chapter 8 when Pharaoh said to Moses, You know, why don you stay here and worship here? And Moses, We can't do that because we're going to sacrifice some animals that are very sacred to you. Well, all these sacred animals now are dying. It's almost like, wow, what are you doing to us? How can this happen? These are animals that we hold sacred, hold dear to us, and now they're just dropping like flies.

They're resources. were affected. The horses were used for military use. The camels were used for the transportation of different resources that they had. And they would use these animals in a very strategic way to keep the economy rolling. Now they're all dead. The carnage was horrendous. The next thing, what you see is the care in the plague. The Bible says this.

But the Lord will make a distinction, verse number four, between the livestock of Israel and the livestock of Egypt, so that nothing will die of all that bel to the sons of Israel. God took special care of the livestock of the Israelites. Protected them, didn't he? He watched over them. You see, when God is into protecting his own, he protects them to the fullest. Not one would die. Not one would perish because God would protect them. That's how God is. The next thing I want you to see is the contempt after the plague.

And that's by Pharaoh himself in verse number 7. It says, But the heart of Pharaoh was hardened, and he did not let the people. Go. Now, at the first part of verse 7, what's it say?

It says that Pharaoh sent to see if it was really true. And yet, Pharaoh, what? Repented? They say, Oh man, this is amazing. I can't believe what Moses as God did. He truly is the ruler of the world, He must be the real, true God. Didn't say that, did He? Hardened His heart. In the face of overwhelming evidence, he said, You know what? I don't believe. I don't believe. How does a man do that? How does a man not see during the time of Christ when he was here and he performed all those miracles? Amazing.

In the midst of all the evidence, am all the truth, they refuse to believe the facts. You know people like that? You've showed them the truth, you've explained to them the truth, and yet they just don't get it. That's how you know that conversion is a supernatural work of God in the heart of a person. God has to draw the individual, you can't convince him. And don't ever think that you can convince them. A lot of times we get on the defensive and say, you know, I can argue somebody into the kingdom.

I can present enough facts to convince them that this is the truth and they need to believe, but we can't do that. In spite of the overwhelming evidence, Pharaoh rejected. He rejected because it's not the miracles that convert anybody. It's the message of the gospel. It's the word of the Lord, right? And in spite of overwhelming evidence, he still refused to believe. Next plague: the Boy. The boils. Something very interesting happens here. Moses enacts this one. Before, it was Aaron who would lay his staff down, and that staff became a snake, became a serpent.

It would be Aaron who would weigh the staff and the Nile would turn the blood. It would be Aaron who would be the instrument of action. But not this time. This time it's Moses. And now Moses is the one who takes the soot and he throws it into the air so that boil comes upon man and beast. Now that's an amazing thing, isn't it? Why? Because a lot of times in Christianity, we love to seek the preeminence. Aaron doesn't argue. Aaron lets Moses do this. He does it in the sight of a Pharaoh. He does it so all could see that's Moses doing this.

Aaron could have said, well, wait a minute, that's my job to do those things. I mean, that's why I'm here. But Aaron didn't do that. Didn't do that at all. Have you ever noticed that there are so many times in the church where we get a little offended when somebody else gets recognized and we don't? That they have a louder ministry than ours is, a more upfront ministry than ours is, or they get the leadership role and I don't get it. One unique thing about Christianity is that those who lead in the church usually are the ones who are not looking to lead.

They're not. Those who want to lead probably shouldn't be leading, but those whom God chooses. i. e. Moses, very reluctant. But realizing that God called them, it's a very humbling kind of experience. They 're not looking to have upfront recognition. They just want to do what God's called them to do. And that's what Moses did. So, the first thing I want you to see about the plague of the Boils is the place.

The place in the plague. And notice the text says in verse number 8. Take for yourselves handfuls of soot from a kilin. That was a brick-making furnace. But the soot that they would take would be from those furnaces used by the Hebrew people to make bricks. And that was part of their slavery. And God would take that which brought pain to his people to bring pain to Pharaoh's people. That's God's divine justice. And then notice the publicity in the plague.

He would do it in front of Pharaoh. He would stand in front of Pharaoh. He would speak in front of Pharaoh. And He would throw the dust in front of Pharaoh. You see, the ministry that Moses was called to was a ministry of confrontation. It was a ministry to stand before the enemy. It was a ministry to stand for God before the enemy of God. And God has called you and me to a very public ministry. And what's that ministry? It's to publicize the truth of the gospel, to tell people all over the world about Jesus Christ.

Himself. The next thing I want you to see is the pitilessness in the plague. The text tells us in verse number 9 these words: It will become fine dust over all the land of Egypt and will become boil. Breaking out with sores on man and beast through all the land of Egypt. Now, think about this. I don't know if you've ever had any open sores on your body or not, but these are all over me. And remember Job? He had open, oozing, pus-flowing sores all over his body from the bottom of his feet to the top of his head.

He was in excruciating pain. And all the Egyptians faced this. They couldn't sit, they couldn't stand, they couldn't walk, they couldn't sleep, they couldn't relax because of these open, oozing so. That God had put upon them. That's amazing. It's almost like you can hear the Egyptian people saying, What next? How can this be? But yet, God was trying to help them understand. That he was ruler. He controlled it all, and they needed to submit to his leadership. Now, note. The Egyptians were into outward purity.

They were into the body beautiful. And the less blemishes, the better. The more perfect the body on the outside, the better and more religious the body on the inside, so they thought. And God will destroy all that by making them all the same, by making them all ugly from the outside. The next thing I want you to notice is the perverters in the plague, the magicians.

They were the perverters. The text tells us they couldn't even stand before Moses anymore. Last time we saw that they recognized that this was the finger of God. And now we have them realizing that, wait a minute, not only is this the finger of God, we can't even stand before Moses anymore. We can't even make our way to Moses anymore. And God was slowly but surely removing all the perverters of the truth. From the presence of Pharaoh and from Moses. And the last thing I want you to see is the promise in the plague.

This is very sad. Listen to what it says. Verse number 12. And the Lord hardened Pharaoh's heart, and he did not listen to them, just as the Lord had spoken to Moses. What did God say? I will harden Pharaoh's heart. That's the promise. God made a promise to Moses: I'm going to harden his heart. He is no longer going to listen.

Romans chapter 1: God gives a man over to the perverse lifestyle, God abandons man. So he's left to his own devices to feel the full repercussions of his sin. All that to say this: it's important for us to understand how God protects. His own. The text says that the boils came upon all the Egyptians. It doesn't say it came upon all the Hebrew people because God is into protecting. His own. And throughout the plagues, we can see the powerful hand of God as He watches over His people. And I want to show you how God's going to do that, not only now, but in the future.

So, like we've done the last few weeks, turn with me in your Bible to the book of Revel, the 7th chapter.

And it says this in verse number 1: After this, I saw four angels standing at the four corners of the earth, holding back the four winds of the earth, so that no wind should blow on the earth. or on the sea, or on any tree. And I saw another angel ascending from the rising of the sun, having the seal of the living God. And he cried out with a loud voice to the four angels to whom it was granted to harm the earth and the sea, saying, Do not harm the earth. or the sea, or the trees, until we have sealed the bonds of our God on their foreheads.

And I heard the number of those who were sealed 1,000 sealed from every tribe of the sons of Israel. There are 1,000 Jews. 12,000 from each tribe that are sealed. And the Lord is telling us that during the time of the tribulation, when all these plagues are happening through the bull judgments and the trumpet judgments and the sealed judgments. There's 144,000 Jewish people that are going to be protected. And when you go to Revelation chapter 14, what do you have? You have 144,000 standing on Mount Zion.

What's it say? It says this, and I looked, and behold, the Lamb was standing on Mount Zion, and with him 100. And forty-four thousand, having his name and the name of his father written on their foreheads. God protected them. You get the Revelation 14, you're at the end. You got the king standing on Mount Zion, which is the city of Jerusalem, and there standing with him are 14,000, the same ones that were sealed in Revelation chapter 7. T to Revelation chapter 12. We 've told you before that Revelation chapter 12 is a history of the world, from the beginning of the world to the end of the world, all in one chapter.

And it summarizes the events of, the most important events of all the world. And the beginning of time, the birth of Christ, the tribulational period. And listen to what it says in verse number five. And she gave birth to a son. That is, Israel, the woman, a male child, who was to rule all the nations with a rod of iron. And her child was caught up to God and to his throne. And the woman, listen.

And the woman fled into the wilderness, where she had a place prepared by God, so that there she might be nourished for one thousand two hundred and sixty days. The wilderness in the Bible is always used of Edom, Moab, and Ammon. All you've got to do is read the Old Testament and see it's the lands east and south of Jerusalem. And those are the desert wastelands. He's prepared a place for her. Now, what's that sound like? John 14: In my father's house are many mansions. If it were not so, I would have told you.

And I go and I pre a place for you. Now there 's a place in the wilderness that is a special place. It's prepared by God. And he will protect his own for three and one-half years. He will protect them because, in the middle of the tribulation, when the Antichrist Reveals himself and demands that the world worship him. He goes after Israel. They're going to need a place to hide. They're going to need to be protected. I know some of you are thinking, are we in Exodus or are we in Revelation? Answer: both.

Revelation 16, verse number 2. And the first angel went and poured out his bowl into the earth. and it became a loathsome and malignant sore upon the men who had the mark of the beast and who worshipped his image. And listen, malignant sores. This is bold number one.

And when the bold judgments finally come, they come in rapid succession. And man is filled with malignant sores. The same kind of sores and boil way back in Exodus chapter 9. But I want you to notice what it says.

It's given to the men who what? Who worship the beast. Who was it not given to? It's not given to Israel. It's not given to Gentile Christians. It's not given to 144,000 Jewish evangelists. It's only given to the ones who worship the beast, who have the mark of the beast on their forehead or the back of their hand. Only those people. Why? Because God's into protecting his own people. That's why. You see that? God's going to watch over his own. He's going to preserve his own. He's going to provide for his own because that's how God works.

Just like in the book of Exodus. When he protected his own people from the plagues. See that? See, this gives us great comfort. I'm sitting in my office this week thinking, man. God is on my side. God's for me. God's going to take care of me. He's going to watch over me. And some of you are thinking, well, does that mean that when I go through the tribulation, these things aren going to happen? Oh, I got better news than that. Turn me to Revelation chapter 3. I'm going let you know something: that God is so concerned about protecting you that He's going to take you out of the world before the tribulation ever comes.

Now, I know that a lot of people don't believe that. In fact, we are in the minority here at Christ Community Church. We're in the minority in a lot of things. But we're in the minority that believe that Jesus Christ is going to take the church. Out of the world before the tribulation comes to the world. We believe that. And I know that the argument is that. That was a later idea that came further down the church. But all the early church fathers believed that the church would go through tribulation.

You know what? We don't base our theology on the early church fathers. We base our theology on the apostles themselves. The church is built upon the foundation of the apostles and the prophets. And every apostle believed in the imminent return of Christ. Every one of them. And I can go through all the epistles and prove to you that they believe that Jesus Christ could come at any moment, the imminent return of Jesus Christ. And the imminent return of Christ means. That nothing else has to happen before Jesus Christ returns.

And every apostle believed that, every single one of them. If I believe something else has to happen before Christ returns, His return is not imminent. It can't happen at any moment. Something else has to happen, i. e. in this case, the tribulation. And then he'll come. No, that's not what the Bible teaches. And all I need is one verse to prove that. Revelation 3, verse number 10, it's a promise given to the church of Philadelphia. Here it is: Because you have kept the word of my perseverance, I also will keep you from the hour of testing, that hour which is about to come upon.

What? The whole world. There has never been an hour of testing to come upon the whole world except for the flood. The phrase the whole world is used throughout the book of Revelation to describe, you got it, the whole world. D take a five-bed of cap to figure that one out, does it? I will watch over you. Do not fear. I will protect you. I am your shield. And God says, not only am I your protector, I'm your shield.

Prize, and God wants you to know that I'm your reward, I'm it. And unfortunately, for the most part, that's not good enough for us. We don't want God as a reward, we want some other kind of reward, and that's exactly why we don't experience His protection. Daily is because his reward is not good enough for us. But if God is your reward, if he's what you prize, you can stand. And if you lose your job, it's okay because you have a reward. You can stand strong because if you lose, if you lose. Someone close to you, God is still your reward.

He's still the greatest thing that ever happened to you, no matter what. And that's what God wants us to learn. Say, how do you get all that from the plagues? Simply this: no matter what the plague, God protects us. That's great.