THE TENTH PLAGUE — DEATH OF THE FIRSTBORN
(12) “For I will go through the land of Egypt on that night and strike down every firstborn, both men and animals, and I will execute judgments against all the gods of Egypt. I am Adonai. (13) The blood will be a sign for you on the houses where you are.[ When I see the blood, I will pass over you. So there will be no plague among you to destroy you when I strike the land of Egypt.”
Exodus 12:12-13, TLV
This is it! The tenth and final plague. This is the plague that is completely and utterly voluntary for men to endure. The other nine plagues there was always some part of Egypt that could not be spared. This time if you feared the Lord, believed what He instructed and obeyed, then whoever you were, Hebrew or Egyptian or any nationality at all, you were promised to be spared the plague IF you followed HaShem’s instructions.
After all nine previous demonstrations, we have a tendency to be shocked that there were people who did not believe and follow these instructions. It seems hard to fathom that there were people who just did not take this seriously and who were not saved. We like to think that we would be much smarter than that. Clearly the Almighty G-d is… well… ALMIGHTY. We know there were people who did not take a Passover Lamb and place the blood on the doorposts and stay in the house. We know this because we read about all the wailing and mourning across the entire land of Egypt, mourning for their firstborn.
Maybe it was just too pricey; lambs probably weren’t cheap. Maybe it was too messy or too much trouble; maybe the neighbors would think we have “lost it”.; or maybe it was just one of those cases where no one else is going to tell me what I ought to do. There are many, many reasons why people don’t obey, probably as many reasons as there are people. And we all know that we are often no better at taking HaShem at His Word than those Egyptians were.
But there it is! All of us are offered the free gift of Salvation. Yeshua, our Passover, has been sacrificed (1 Corinthians 5:6-8). All that is required is for us; to fear HaShem; to believe what He has said; and, in obedience, to apply that precious Blood to the doorposts of our lives.
Questions to ponder: Have you applied the Blood of Yeshua to the doorposts of your life? Have you let anything, or anyone, distract you from following HaShem’s instructions? Are there people in your life that HaShem is placing on your heart to pray for for them to come to His Salvation?