Exodus chapter 8, let's look at verse 16. And the Lord
said unto Moses, saying to Aaron, stretch out thy rod and smite
the dust of the land that it may become lice throughout all
the land of Egypt. And they did so for Aaron stretched
out his hand with his rod and smoked the dust of the earth.
And it became lice in man and in beast. All the dust of the
land became lice throughout all the land of Egypt. And the magicians
did so with their enchantments to bring forth lice, but they
could not. So there were lice upon man and
upon beast. Then the magicians said unto
Pharaoh, this is the finger of God. And Pharaoh's heart was
hardened, and he hearkened not unto them, as the Lord had said. Let's consider tonight the significance
of the lice. Why lice? Why not roaches? Why
not snakes? why these particular plagues
that the Lord sent. Let me say first of all that
though each one of these plagues has its own significance and
the circumstances surrounding each one of them has particular
significance, let's not forget the main teachings that we see
in all of the plagues. The fact that there are consequences
to disobeying God. and that all of his enemies shall
ultimately be destroyed. There's no resisting God. There's
no fighting God. That his people shall go free
from bondage and from the plagues of this wicked world. God is
irresistibly powerful and sovereign. These signs and wonders were
spoken of from this time forward to this very night. God does
as he pleases, his will shall be done in spite of all opposition. The most powerful man on earth
at this time, no doubt, was Pharaoh. But man at his best state is
altogether vanity. The highest of men is like a
grasshopper to the Lord Jesus Christ. His will shall be done. That teaching is clear in all
of the plagues. You may produce snakes of your
own, but the Lord will swallow yours up. You may produce frogs
with your idolatrous enchantments and the magicians of this world
that call themselves preachers of the gospel do that very thing.
But all you've done after all you've done is add to your own
plague. You may resist bowing to God
like Pharaoh did, obeying God and bowing to his son. Perhaps
you consider your own throne of free will to be one that God
has no right to violate. I've heard people say, God won't
violate my free will. God violates everything you are
and everything you have and everything you think you are. Every day,
every day, every moment. And bow you shall in the end.
as powerful as you may think you are. We learn this in all of these
plagues, don't we? When God is saving his people,
stay out of his way. Get out of the way. Don't get
between God and his little ones. God said, let my people go. You
don't resist that. You don't resist. You don't trifle
with that. Even that which signifies the
salvation of God's people. When men trifled with it in the
scriptures, God killed them on the spot. Turn to Matthew chapter
18. I wanted to look at this again. So we see this in these plagues
and in the ultimate destruction of Pharaoh and the people of
Egypt. Matthew 18 six, the Lord said, who so shall offend one
of these little ones which believe in me? It were better for him
that a millstone were hanged about his neck and that he were
drowned in the depth of the sea. Now look at verse 10. I know
you've probably heard verse six and could almost have quoted
it, but look at verse 10, skip down to verse 10. Look at what
he said here. Take heed that you despise not
one of these little ones. One of my children, one of my
sheep. How come? For I say unto you that in heaven
their angels do always behold the face of my Father which is
in heaven." What does he mean by that? The heavenly creatures
that protect these little ones that you're despising, that you
would harm, that you would oppose or hurt in some way. The ones who can protect them,
the ones who can destroy you in a blink or behold in the face
of God waiting for the word. All God has to do is will it.
Didn't he say when Peter cut off that high priest here, he
said, don't you know that I could call on my heavenly father and
there'd be more than 12 legions of angels right here to defend
me if that's what I came here for. And his little ones are
the same. They're angels. They're angels. Did you notice that? They're
angels. Did you know you had some angels? The Lord has assigned some to
you. And they're watching his face,
waiting to do his bidding. And it's his will that you never
even dash your foot against a stone, spiritually speaking. No harm,
not one hair of your head will ever be harmed. Not a dog will
even wag its tongue toward you. That's what he said. The plague
will be, will descend upon all of God's enemies, but he said
it won't come near you. And your angels are beholden
the face of the father tonight. Four, verse 11, for the son of
man is come to save Isn't that what he's doing in Egypt? He
said, I've heard you cry. I've come down here to save.
And that's what he's doing in this world. You don't stand between
God and the salvation of his people. You false preachers that
might hear this, probably not, but who knows? Maybe there's
an enemy here tonight. Maybe someone will hear this
on the internet. Don't get between God and his
little sheep. And whether an enemy hears it or not, that's
comforting to me. How about you? That's comforting
to me. Pharaoh represents anyone that
opposes God's purpose of electing grace and delivering his people
from bondage. Anybody who opposes that by any
means, all of the plagues of the Bible
are upon your head. All of God's wrath is upon you.
teaching false doctrine or supporting those who do, discouraging his
little ones from worshiping him. I don't recommend raising a finger
against one of God's sheep. We see that clearly in all of
these plagues, don't we? Not one of God's people shall
perish, but all shall be saved in spite of all of their enemies.
John 639, the Lord said, this is the Father's will, which has
sent me that of all that he has given me, I should lose nothing,
but should raise it up again at the last day. Every one of
his children, every one of his sheep, every one of his elect,
he's gonna raise us up at the last day and bring us home to be with
him forever. Our spiritual heavenly Moses will not leave a single
child in Egypt. God has sworn. He said, I've
surely seen the affliction of my people, which are in Egypt.
That's the world. God sees us. He's seen all of
his people throughout all the history of time. And he sees
us here tonight. And he said, I've heard their
cry by reason of their taskmaster. My reason of the bondage, and
I know their sorrows. And I am come down to deliver
them out of the hand of the Egyptians. He came down, didn't he? He came
down. And to bring them up out of that
land unto a good land and a large. Unto a land flowing with milk
and honey. Exodus 3, 7, and 8. And Christ
our Deliverer has come down. He came where we were. Oh, how
He humbled Himself. And how He came down to where
I was. And by His holy life as my representative
in this world, my mediator. And by His sacrificial death,
as my propitiation, my sin offering before God, my lamb, my spotless
lamb. He's delivered us from the bondage
of the law, the bondage of sin, the bondage of Satan, all bondage,
all of our taskmasters have to let us go because he has delivered
us. Now, before the first two plagues,
God issued a warning to Pharaoh. You may have noticed the absence
of that in this case. He said, if you refuse, here's
what I'm going to do. Not this time. No warning. A
warning from God. He doesn't know it to you, does
he? He doesn't know it. A warning from God is a mercy
from God. And now in our day by the gospel,
there's a warning in there. There's a warning to men, but
one day the Lord will come as a thief in the night. There'll
be no warning. Now we have warning, don't we?
Acts 13, 39, the preacher said by him, all that believe are
justified from all things which you could not be justified from
which you could not be justified by the law of Moses. Beware therefore,
beware. There's justification from sin
by faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, but beware lest that come upon
you which is spoken of in the prophets. Behold, you despisers
and wonder and perish for our work a work in your days, a work
which you shall in no wise believe though a man declare it unto
you. Beware lest somebody declare the truth to you and you despise
it. Beware lest God warn you and you don't heed the warning.
There's warning now. But one day there'll be no warning.
Peter said in 2 Peter 3 10, the day of the Lord will come as
a thief in the night. Thief doesn't call you up and
say, I'm going to be busting in your house in a little while.
He comes suddenly without warning in which the heavens shall pass
away with a great noise. The judgment of God will come
without warning and the elements shall melt with fervent heat.
the earth also and the works that are therein shall be burned
up." So God sends this third plague without warning reminding
us that he didn't owe us warning. We're all worthy of his condemnation
and wrath and it's of his mercies that it's delayed and that there
is space to repent. Mercy toward his people. Now
what are lice? Let's consider this plague. The
first plague corresponds with the last one. There's blood,
blood. These plagues begin and end with
blood. And we've seen that, that there
was blood throughout all the land. A plague to the Egyptians,
but deliverance to the Jews. Blood, his blood. Picture the
blood of Christ, which is the salvation of his people, but
the very curse of God upon his enemies. like the Ark of the
Covenant, which brought death and God's curse to everybody
else who tried to possess it. But when they brought it home
into the land of Israel, David danced before it. It was prosperity and blessing
to them. So Christ and his atonement are
death and judgment to the reprobate, but life and justification to
the child of God. And so we see that first plague.
And then the second plague, the frogs. Only one other place in
the scripture, other than those verses in the Psalms where the
frogs in Egypt were referred to directly, was in the book
of Revelation where we saw that they signified unclean spirits
that came out of Satan and his prophets. And they are the judgment
of God upon this earth. And if you think about this third
judgment or plague, All of these plagues are God's judgment upon
the earth, the blood. Why blood? Because the wages
of sin is death. God's judgment against sin is
death, blood. That's why the Lord Jesus Christ
had to shed his precious blood in the place of his people, in
their stead, as their substitute. Because God, in his holiness,
in his justice, demands death. That's his judgment against sin.
Unclean spirits are in the earth. Why because God cast Satan out
of heaven down to the earth and His prophets tonight as I stand
here in this pulpit pulpit have frogs coming out of their mouths
Unclean spirits, that's God's judgment also against this earth.
Well, the third one is what? What what is this third judgment
or plague? The land is full of lice This
shows the nature of man who is under the curse of sin. God's
judgment, God's plague against those who rebel, those who will
not bow to his will. That's what the Garden of Eden,
that's what happened there. God said, this is my will, this
is my word, this is my law. You shall eat of every tree but
this one. Adam did the same thing Pharaoh
did. He refused to bow to the will of God. And so what's this
judgment? It's the curse of sin. Sin is
rebellion against God. That's what it always is. And
that's what Pharaoh epitomizes here in his defiance of God's
will. And what does that make him?
What is Pharaoh? What is somebody? What is a sinner? What is someone who defies the
will of God? And what is God's curse upon
them? Lice. Lice. A louse. One lice is a louse. And a louse is a blood-sucking
parasite that lives off of its host. It drains life from its
host and has no other purpose in life. The life of a louse
has this purpose and this purpose only. to drain life from somebody
else, from its host, from whoever it attaches itself to. And it
also spreads disease. That's just the nature of the
thing. It just spreads disease wherever it goes. And it produces
others who are just like it. That's what they do. That's what
they do. And God is showing us now with
this plague what we are in his world. What our role is, apart
from him, outside of his grace, having refused to bow, having
refused to obey, in our fallen nature before God, we're parasites
in God's world. This is not the only place in
the scripture where we're referred to that way. A parasite lives
on its host and derives benefit at the host's expense. It relies on and exploits its
host and gives nothing in return. Nothing in return. There's no
benefit to you whatsoever in having lice. Absolutely not. On the contrary. All they do
is feed, feed. They cut into the flesh with
their teeth and they drink. Proverbs 13, 14, listen to this,
talking about people. There is a generation whose teeth
are as swords and their jaw teeth as knives to devour the poor
from off the earth and the needy from among men. The horse leech
has two daughters crying give, give. We cry give, give because
we're takers. That's all we do, we're parasites
in God's world. By nature, as sinners before
God now. We give nothing in return, we
just take. And we say give, give, give,
all the time. That's all the people of this
world are doing. They're saying God give me this, God give me
that, God do that for me. And they give nothing in return.
Nothing. No praise, no honor, no glory,
no gratitude. That's all we can give God anyway,
and that's only by His grace. That's all that Adam ever gave.
Before he was a louse, what did he give back to God? Gratitude,
praise, service, love. But man fell and became a louse. And now we have nothing for God.
But we want God to do everything for us, don't we? We're takers,
consumers. And lice are, as I said, are
spreaders of disease. They're a shameful reproach upon
their host. As far as I know, I've never
had lice, but my children have had it, and I didn't want anybody
to know about it. And if I had it, I wouldn't tell anybody I've
got lice, you know. It's, it's, there's a reproach
that goes along with it. when someone has them there to
be avoided like a leper. Because they'll get on me. They'll
contaminate me. And our children got lice from
someone in school. And some of you, probably most
of you, your children have had lice before and they're insidious
creatures, aren't they? They're hard to get rid of. They're
greedy for blood. And they're disgusting. You know
what I'm talking about. These are the Strokes with which
God's Word paints us, the sinner. We're referred to as maggots
in the Word of God. What people don't understand
about sinnerhood is, oh, I've done some bad things in my life. That's not the problem. That's
not the problem. The problem with these lice is
not that they suck blood or that they spread disease. The problem
is they're lice. Those are just symptoms of the
problem. You see, it's not that you've just done some bad thing,
it's what you are before God. And if we can ever, and God is
clear and graphic in his word concerning our nature. Like a
leper, from the top of our head to the soles of our feet, the
Lord said there's no soundness in us, but wounds and bruises
and putrefying sores. That's disgusting to even think
about, I know it is. That's because you and I in our
sinful nature before God are disgusting and vile and wretched. We're parasites. God can't even
look at it. He turned his back on his own
son when he took our sin upon himself. We're described in terms
that I'm almost embarrassed to even use from the pulpit. Like a dog eating its vomit. That makes my stomach turn. And
when I looked at Just looking at a picture of
a louse can make you sick at your stomach. A contemptible
parasite among society. When somebody's referred to as
a louse, that's not used so much anymore. But in the old days,
they'd say, he's a louse. You're a contemptible parasite
in society. That's what you are. If you're
said to have loused something up, I used to use that when I
was real young, you've loused it up. That means you've spoiled
it, you've ruined it. That's what we are. We spoil
everything we touch. Egypt is the world all through
the scripture, as we've said. And because of God's curse upon
man for our defiance of his will in the garden, this world is
filled with lies. We live off of God. We derive
life and all of God's natural blessings from God. And we're
shameful and contemptible. We're not grateful for it. We
give nothing in return. We live off of our host, and
we just devour all of our lives. We devour everything good that
we find, and spread our disease upon everything that we touch,
defiling everything that we touch, and we produce more just like
ourselves. Notice that these lice were made from the dust
of the earth. In Genesis 2-7, the Lord God
formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his
nostrils the breath of life, and man became a living soul.
And the next thing that God made out of the dust of the ground
is lice. Listen to Genesis 3.19, In the
sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread, till thou return unto
the ground. For out of it was thou taken,
for dust thou art, and unto dust shalt thou return. And just like
these lice, sinners come from dust, they live off of God, they
exploit the life of God, they benefit from God's goodness,
they glorify themselves with the glory that belongs only to
God alone. giving nothing in return, spreading
disease and reproducing others like themselves, and then they
return to the dust. The spiritual reality of our
sin is horrible as this plague in Egypt must have been. What
a horrible plague. Can you imagine? All of the dust
of the earth was turned to lice. When my children had lice, it
made my, I would see, we would find them on them, and my head
would itch for the rest of the day, and I didn't even have any.
Just looking at them made me miserable. And it made me hurt
for them and pity them. But the spiritual plague of sin
is infinitely worse. This is just a picture, like
the others in the Word of God that picture us, our leprosy,
our impotence, our vileness before God. I'm sure you noticed in
the passage there that the magicians were unable to reproduce the
sign of the lice in verse 18. They had been able to, produced
the turning water into blood, or at least they gave a good
show. They were able to produce frogs,
make some frogs come up out of the rivers, but they weren't
able to reproduce this sign of the lice. And I'm not sure why
this is said about this particular sign, but I know why they were
unable, because God shut them up. God said, that's enough,
you're done. And they didn't make any attempt
after this to ever reproduce anything. that God had done. And God right now, God's not
pleased right now to stop the mouths of those who are imposters
and imitators in this world of the word of his power, the gospel.
There are those who with their enchantments imitate the gospel. God's not pleased yet to shut
him up, but one day he will. One day he will. You know, Pharaoh
was somewhat vindicated, though falsely, by these earlier imitations. I'm sure that he took some pride
in the fact that his magicians were able to at least make an
effort, at least for a couple of seconds until the snake that
the Lord had made swallowed up the snakes that the magicians
had produced somehow or another. But the day is coming when God
alone shall be exalted. The Lord Jesus alone, every one
that's proud and haughty will be abased brought down into the
dust, and the Lord alone shall be exalted. Every tongue shall
confess that it's the finger of God. Every knee shall bow,
and every tongue shall confess that Jesus Christ is Lord. Isaiah
210, enter into the rock and hide thee in the dust for fear
of the Lord. And for the glory of his majesty,
the lofty looks of man shall be humbled. and the haughtiness
of men shall be bowed down, and the Lord alone shall be exalted
in that day." That will be a happy day for God's people. And I know this, the magicians,
they weren't able to reproduce this sign. There's something
that they never were able to do. And from the start to the
end, they could never undo what God had done. They never could
They can imitate some of the signs, and some say they were
even able to actually, by the power of evil, to perform some
of the signs. Maybe they were, I don't know.
It doesn't really matter. It's still an imitation of God's power,
whether it was real or fake. They're still just imitating
what God did. But they could not bring one second of relief
from the judgment of God. Not one second. And you know
they tried. You know they tried. You know
they did everything they possibly could think of. And Pharaoh was
calling everybody he knew. And they were all putting their
great minds together and figuring out a way to get out of this
thing without bowing to the God of the Hebrews. None can stay
the hand of our God or say unto him, what doest thou? He opens
and no man shuts and he shuts and no man opens. They couldn't
put their hand to anything that God did. not one second of relief
could be produced by their enchantments. And man's enchantments and imitation
gospel might fool some into thinking that those who do them have some
power from God, but they won't solve man's problem. They can
say God and heaven and hell and Jesus and sing, oh how I loved
you, and use the same Bible we do. But the false gospel of man's
free will religion will not buy one second of relief from the
judgment of God. It won't take away the plague
of sin or remove God's judgment against sin. Only the gospel,
the genuine gospel of God's redeeming love and power in Christ, the
gospel of Christ crucified, reveals how the curse can be removed
from a sinner by the Savior God's substitute for sinners, living
and dying in their stead, and only by faith in that true gospel
of Christ, by faith in Christ, who is the gospel, does God give
relief from the plague of sin, from the condemnation of God
against our rebellion. The magicians can't produce it.
No peace. They cry, peace, peace, but there
isn't any peace. Oh, but when the Lord speaks
peace, we can say with Paul, there is therefore now no condemnation. The plague is gone. The curse
is gone. The magicians had to admit in
verse 19, this is the finger of God. But though they couldn't
deny the truth, this didn't break their hearts. It didn't cause
them to bow. The truth only hardened their
hearts all the more. The magician said unto Pharaoh,
this is the finger of God. And Pharaoh's heart was hardened.
And he hearkened not unto them, just like God said he wouldn't.
Nothing can make the flesh anything but flesh. Nicodemus, that which
is born of the flesh, is flesh. Nothing availeth but a new creation.
The old heart will never bow. The old man will never submit. The only thing for the old man
is death. We must be given a new heart
by Christ. We must be born again, a new
creation. And that new creation will bow.
He's born bowing. Religion is trying to scare people
into heaven with the terrors of hell. Have you witnessed any
of that? They write books and produce
movies called things like Left Behind and the like, trying to
scare people into repentance. It's a waste of time. And worse
than that, it's an affront to God Almighty. God must grant
repentance, and he doesn't do it that way. The way he said
he does it is by the preaching of the gospel of Christ Jesus.
The truth of God's judgment against their rebellion could not be
denied. It's the finger of God. And yet
there was no repentance. But bless God, what a picture
this is now in this world of swarming, shameful, disgusting
lice. God has a people. And huddled
around in little huts somewhere in that land of Egypt, in the
land of Goshen, which was right there in the land of Egypt. Horrible as it was, swarming
with parasites. God's people waited for the salvation
of the Lord. And that's what, that's us. That's
a snapshot of us right here tonight. In this world full of lice, the
people of God are waiting for his salvation. We look for Him. We rejoice in Christ Jesus and
have no confidence in the flesh, but wait for His salvation. It's
just like that today. This earth is cursed and swarming
with parasites, and nobody can remove that curse. But right
in the midst of it, right in the middle of Egypt, there are
God's people, and for them, There's no curse. Because why? Christ
hath redeemed us from the curse of the law. How did he do that? Galatians 3.13, by being made
a curse for us. Christ became our curse. He became
what we are. That we might be what he is,
the very righteousness of God in him. He redeemed us from the
curse of the law, being made a curse for us. What did he redeem
us with? His precious blood. The plagues
begin and end with blood. And before this is all over with,
the very thing that God had been commanding Pharaoh to do from
the start, Pharaoh's going to do. He's going to let God's people
go. And the way the Lord is going
to accomplish that is by the blood of the sacrificial lamb,
the Passover lamb. You shall take a lamb and slay
it and put its blood upon the posts of the door. And when I
see the blood, I'll pass over you." So here we are tonight
in this world full of parasites just like us. But because of
the one who became a curse for us, there's no curse upon us.
There's relief from the judgment of God.