This narrative of the plagues is important within the Bible as a whole because it foreshadows the final judgement. We see this reflected in Revelation 16 where the plagues are God’s response to the evil being done to his people. That is also the case here in the Exodus story. The gesture of taking ashes out of the furnace and scattering them (to unleash a plague of boils) is symbolic of a couple of things. Firstly, Egyptian magicians sometimes used ashes in magical rituals to end plagues, but here God bids Moses to use ashes to inflict a plague on Egypt. So, straight away, the Magicians’ potential remedy is turned against them before they have the opportunity to apply it. The second point of significance to this gesture of the use of ashes from the furnace is the high probability that the furnace in question was a kiln used by the Israelites to bake bricks. In this case the ashes would symbolise the Israelites’ oppression. God is applying the promise of Genesis 12:3 (“Those who curse you I will curse”) in a way that had clear force for Pharaoh and his lackies. These ten plagues were not just signs to convince Pharaoh. The plagues were God’s response to the oppression of his people. Judgement is inevitable. In the end no one ‘gets away’ with anything. The only exception will be for those who have entrusted themselves to Christ. The world is yet to see a much greater judgement of this kind. Let that be a sobering thought and let it remind us to cling to Jesus who shields us in his grace.
Ask God to search your heart and purge away whatever might be leading you astray.
Read Exodus 9:8-12
