I find it interesting that when Moses’ staff was turned into a snake to demonstrate God’s power, Pharaoh’s magicians were able to do the same thing “by their secret arts”. This underlines the fact that the religions of the ancient Near East were not just harmless fancies of misguided religious seekers. These men were tapping into something real and very dark. The law of God, later given to Moses, would strictly forbid the practice of sorcery and witchcraft of this kind and, in doing so, it was not just ruling against ‘superstition’. This was no mere superstition, and neither were those religious systems that God told the Israelites to eradicate in the promised land of Canaan. They were sourced in dark demonic places and their limited power was certainly a reality. These people were not just given over to sin but entirely given over to Satan. But note how Satan works here. He simply mimics the work of God and in this he is limited. He may be able to do ‘tricks’, but only God determined the fate of Egypt. The spiritual realm is a real and present reality and there is a lot that is evil behind this mysterious spiritual curtain. But the child of God has nothing to fear. Satan may try to pretend to have something of God’s power, but in reality he has infinitely less than what it takes to rule as God rules. The choice is yours. Will you be ruled by God or will you be blown around by the whim of a spiritual reality that wants to keep you in the dark?
Entrust your life to God.
Read Exodus 7:8-13
