And the Lord said to Moses, “See, I have made you like God to Pharaoh, and your brother Aaron shall be your prophet. 2 You shall speak all that I command you, and your brother Aaron shall tell Pharaoh to let the people of Israel go out of his land. 3 But I will harden Pharaoh’s heart, and though I multiply my signs and wonders in the land of Egypt, 4 Pharaoh will not listen to you. Then I will lay my hand on Egypt and bring my hosts, my people the children of Israel, out of the land of Egypt by great acts of judgment. 5 The Egyptians shall know that I am the Lord, when I stretch out my hand against Egypt and bring out the people of Israel from among them.” 6 Moses and Aaron did so; they did just as the Lord commanded them. 7 Now Moses was eighty years old, and Aaron eighty-three years old, when they spoke to Pharaoh.
8 Then the Lord said to Moses and Aaron, 9 “When Pharaoh says to you, ‘Prove yourselves by working a miracle,’ then you shall say to Aaron, ‘Take your staff and cast it down before Pharaoh, that it may become a serpent.’” 10 So Moses and Aaron went to Pharaoh and did just as the Lord commanded. Aaron cast down his staff before Pharaoh and his servants, and it became a serpent. 11 Then Pharaoh summoned the wise men and the sorcerers, and they, the magicians of Egypt, also did the same by their secret arts. 12 For each man cast down his staff, and they became serpents. But Aaron’s staff swallowed up their staffs. 13 Still Pharaoh’s heart was hardened, and he would not listen to them, as the Lord had said. (Exodus 7:1-13)
Moses and Aaron Reassured (v. 1-7)
Exodus chapter 7 picks up in the middle of this conversation between Moses and the Lord. The Lord was telling Moses to go back to Pharaoh, and Moses was asking the Lord at the end of chapter 6, “How will Pharaoh listen to me? For I am a man of uncircumcised lips.” God answers this question in verse one, telling Moses that He has made him like God to Pharaoh. Now this obviously is not saying that Moses was made a deity, but it is showing the authority and power that Moses will have over Pharaoh, as Yahweh’s representative to Pharaoh. Oftentimes rulers and governing authorities were called gods, and so Moses would be like a ruler to Pharaoh, demanding he submit to the authority Yahweh invested in him.
So God says that He has made Moses like God to Pharaoh and his brother Aaron shall be his prophet. So Moses would not even have to do the talking. Aaron would speak for him. God would speak to Moses, giving him the words to put into Aaron’s mouth, Moses would speak these words to Aaron, and Aaron would speak them to Pharaoh. So also in this way was Moses like God to Pharaoh, Moses would communicate to Pharaoh through a mediator, through a prophet.
The rest of verse 1-7 is material that we have already covered in previous weeks, much of it even last week. And so we see how God loves to reassure His promises to His people. God loves to give continual assurance and repetition that we might be strengthened to obey all that He has commanded us. God reminds Moses that He will harden Pharaoh’s heart, and though the signs and wonders that God does will be great, Pharaoh will not listen. So Moses is not to be discouraged at the continued defiance of Pharaoh, nor is Moses to consider Pharaoh’s defiance as failure, but rather as the fulfilled promises of God. Last week we saw that contrast of Pharaoh’s strong hand on the Hebrews, and God’s strong hand that will come down on Pharaoh, and again God reiterates here, “I will lay my hand on Egypt and bring my hosts, my people the children of Israel, out of the land of Egypt by great acts of judgment.” There is the salvation and judgment we talked about last week. Again God says here, “when I stretch out my hand against Egypt and bring out the people of Israel from among them,” then the Egyptians will know Yahweh is God.
I would like to make one further point here. Notice the language that has been used over and over again, that God is going to bring his people OUT from the land of Egypt. He is going to bring them out. This is one of God’s purposes in saving sinners. If the Exodus is typological of our salvation in Christ, that we are delivered from the bondage of sin in the kingdom of darkness and brought into the Kingdom of light and freedom, then we also are brought OUT FROM Egypt. In other words, we are brought out of something into something else. When God brought the people up out of Egypt the next thing God did was give them the law, so that they might live holy lives and live distinctly from Egypt and the Canaanites. They were called out of bondage, and into righteousness. Exodus is the deliverance – what comes after Exodus? Leviticus, a book that is so deeply about Christ, but on a surface level and very true level, it’s a book about holy living in that covenant. About being a set apart people from the nations at that time. So it is a picture of our salvation. We aren’t saved and then called to live in separate Ghettos and be totally separate from unbelievers in the world, but we are called out of our lives of sin, and to live differently than the world, though we still live in and amongst the world. We are called out of sin and into righteousness. In fact we are salt and light to the world – distinct from it, yet vital to the world, for the discipling of it. As it says in Ephesians 2, “For by grace you have been saved through faith,” and then a verse or two later, “For we are created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.” God freely, totally, and sovereignly redeems His people, with the intention that they live distinctly, walking in good works, resisting the devil, being salt and light.
Back in Exodus 7, we’ll spend the rest of our time in verse 8-13.
Representation
One element of the confrontation at play in our text is the element of representation. Representation is something built all into the world in which we live. Representation has to do with hierarchy. Whether its government, business, or other areas of communication, those with higher authority send representatives to various tasks and meetings to carry out their bidding for them, so to speak. And those representatives are given, or vested with, real authority. But it is an authority that is derived from who they represent and is under that higher authority. Throughout the Bible, God sends all kinds of representatives, angels as messengers, prophets, good kings, His priests, the apostles, and today it is chiefly Christ’s Church, that represents God in the world. Jesus Christ of course was and is more than just a representative, but is God in the flesh, God Himself, the second person of the trinity.
So in Exodus we have Moses as God’s representative, whom God has given a real authority and power in this situation before Pharaoh. Moses is God’s representative, and Aaron is Moses’ representative. On the other side, you have Pharaoh who is a representative of the Egyptian gods, seen as a god himself, and we know that underneath that is the serpent, the enemy, the kingdom of darkness. So Pharaoh represents the serpent, and his wise men, sorcerers, and magicians, represent Pharaoh.
Staffs
Then we have the staffs that are a huge part of this story. The staffs also have to do with representation. They also have to do with vested authority and power. The staffs are the instrument through which the higher authority and power performs the miracle. We’ve seen in previous chapters how Moses’ staff was commissioned by God for its use in performing miracles and signs, and it is even called the staff of God. Then we also see here that Aaron was authorized by God through Moses to use his staff for these signs as well. In opposition to them are the wise men, sorcerers, and magicians of Pharaoh who appear on the scene with staffs of power in their hands as well. Their staffs representing the authority and power of Pharaoh and their secret arts, which I believe to be demonic powers. So we have once again a conflict of authority seen in the two sets of staffs of power. Pharaoh versus Yahweh, God’s priests versus demonic priests. God’s Word versus man’s word. God’s kingdom versus the kingdom of Egypt.
Before we go any further, we have to ask the most disputed question about this passage: was this miracle that the Egyptian magicians performed after Moses and Aaron real or was it a fake slight of hand? Was this a fantastic smoke and mirrors trick, or was this a genuine power they had to transform their staffs into serpents as well? The short answer is that I believe this was a genuine power they were able to channel and thus truly performed this sign as well as Moses and Aaron. Not only is this plausible in a Christian biblical view of the world, but it is entirely consistent with it. The power of darkness is seen in scripture as a very real and dangerous power. The Egyptians were known for worshiping a number of false gods, and no doubt some of whom were real demonic powers through which they performed wicked things.
Notice what the text tells us in verse 11 – these men were called wise men – obviously not wise in the wisdom of God, but men with great knowledge and insight of insidious powers. These men are called sorcerers, which is a real spiritual category in Scripture. The Israelites were banned from sorcery, not because it was fake and harmless, but because it was real, and it was dangerous, because of the demonic activity it involved. The sorcerers in verse 11 are also called magicians of Egypt, but magician doesn’t have to mean silly sleight of hand tricks like we think of today, for one, the text says they did these things by their secret arts – secret knowledge demonic insights on performing these signs. Even in the New Testament, Jesus warns His disciples that false christ’s will come performing signs and wonders. This is a biblical reality. Why do you think Pharaoh would tell Moses and Aaron to perform a sign in order to prove themselves? Because that was something these wise men and sorcerers did to show that they had true power from the gods, as they saw it, and were thus to be listened to as representatives.
So on the one hand you have Christians who don’t want to say that was a real sign that was done, maybe for a couple of reasons. One, they’ve been so inculcated with a rationalistic materialistic worldview, that they think miracles like this are not possible, but because they are Christians they believe only God can do miracles. And two, I think for some it may be a fear to say that there is real demonic power that has done things like this. But we’re not supposed to be afraid of that because what happens? Aaron’s staff eats up their staffs. God’s power is greater.
Rushdoony mentions in his commentary on the staffs turning to serpents that in the years before World War 2, missionaries, especially those in the Sudan Interior Mission, reported, at times, events very very similar to this, as well as a variety of other manifestations which they saw as supernatural and demonic. Not only missionaries at that time in Sudan, but there have been many missionaries in all kinds of places around the world who have reported supernatural demonic activity.
But then, on the other hand you have western unbelievers who don’t believe in God, who reject the parting of the Red Sea, and they reject the resurrection of Christ, and reject all the miracles of the Bible. Except, there is now, and has been a growing number of those people who are more and more willing to believe in real demonic powers. Rushdoony puts it this way, “…many people now are more ready to believe in demonic miracles than in Christian ones… Where the fear of God is weakened or gone, the fear of evil powers grows rapidly.” This is very much the situation our society is finding itself in more and more. This is a great deception. There are all kinds of movies and shows out there that depict paranormal and demonic powers, and the way they are almost always depicted as being defeated is not through the power of Jesus Christ who rose from the dead and reigns today. It is not even through some general idea of God. It’s almost always through humanistic means and measures. That is a great deception. In that worldview, man has become the god, man has become the ultimate good in himself, man has it within himself, and that is false.
Moses and Aaron did not fight these Egyptian sorcerers or the gods of Egypt with their own human strength and power, and not even with their own skills and abilities. But they were entirely dependent on the strength and power of God to fight for them. And He did. All they were to do was obey all that God commanded of them.
Serpents
Let’s consider now the miracle or sign that takes place here in our text – this conflict of power. The staff of Aaron is thrown down and becomes a serpent. We’ve seen this before with Moses at the burning bush, and when Moses performed this sign for the elders and people of Israel, now it is done through Aaron before Pharaoh. Pharaoh calls his men in and there is a number of them with staffs, who perform this same sign, throwing their staffs down which turn into serpents.
Something interesting to consider is that the Hebrew word translated into serpent here is the same word that is used elsewhere throughout the Old Testament that is translated into dragon or crocodile. Now, I think that it was indeed a snake because of the fact that is what God previously showed Moses as a sign and the serpent symbolism of Egypt and the enemy in the Bible is very rich. Though it indeed may have been a serpent, it could be that Moses in writing this is seeking to show increase in the enemy, by using a word more general of reptilian creatures as snakes, and sea-beasts like crocodile. If that is the case, it would be interesting narrative progression consistent with the story of Scripture, and that is that up to Christ’s death, resurrection, and ascension, the enemy increased in size and craftiness. Men became more and more ungodly until their sins were full and it was the right time for Christ to come. In Genesis, in the garden it was a serpent, that seemed harmless enough to the woman, and by the time we get to Revelation it is a great dragon, which is called the ancient serpent, the ancient serpent has grown into a great dragon that is thrown down and defeated. So certainly things are heating up as this sign is performed before Pharaoh in conflict with his sorcerers who do the same, and I imagine it no doubt could have been quite the size of snake which ate up all the others.
What is the significance of the staffs turning to snakes here? Certainly, as we have mentioned the image of the snake played a role in the worship of false gods in Egypt. Even to this day, serpent imagery is used in satanic cult worship and symbolism. Biblically, we know the serpent is a theme of the enemy, as we mentioned the garden, which reminds us of the Genesis 3:15 promise that the seed of the woman crushes the head of the serpent. That theme is of course developed all throughout Scripture leading to the dragon of Revelation. Not only is this generally a sign of the devil, of the enemy of God, but Egypt is referred to with this imagery elsewhere in the Bible. Pharaoh is a great serpent king, a servant of Satan. In Ezekiel 29 God says, “Behold, I am against you, Pharaoh king of Egypt, the great dragon that lies in the midst of his streams, that says, ‘My Nile is my own; I made it for myself.’ I will put hooks in your jaws, and make the fish of your streams stick to your scales; and I will draw you up out of the midst of your streams, with all the fish of your streams that stick to your scales. And I will cast you out into the wilderness, you and all the fish of your streams; you shall fall on the open field, and not be brought together or gathered. To the beasts of the earth and to the birds of the heavens I give you as food.”
Again in Ezekiel 32:2 God refers to Pharaoh King of Egypt, saying, “You consider yourself a lion of the nations, but you are like a dragon in the seas…” God goes on to say He will cast His net on Him and haul him out in His dragonnet and give him as food for the birds of the heavens and beasts of the earth.
So the serpent is the devil, and in this case working through Pharaoh King of Egypt. So why is it then that Aaron’s staff also turns into a serpent? Well the devil didn’t create the serpent. God did. The serpent belongs to God and God redeems all His creation. It was a bronze serpent that Moses lifted up in the wilderness that all Israel could look to be healed. And it is that serpent that Jesus says He will be lifted up like in John, when He is lifted up on the cross. I believe that shows us that in our salvation Jesus became a curse for us. In our salvation through judgment Jesus became our sin, so that it would be totally judged, so that in Him we might become the righteousness of God. If you know how bad the serpent is in the Bible, think of how uncomfortable it is to think of looking to a bronze serpent for salvation – now think a trillion times over – how can we bear the thought of Christ becoming sin – it’s so uncomfortable! Yet that is the only way by which we are saved – through great acts of judgment! And it was in that that Christ outsmarted the crafty serpent of old. Christ became sin, and willingly laid down His life – and when He did, death thought “how easy this was!” Yet, when death went for Christ, Christ was bearing that curse of death, and so death ran itself through – it is the greatest victory!
So when the Aaron’s staff swallows all the other staffs of the Egyptian sorcerers, we are shown the victory of Christ – certainly the victory of Yahweh over Pharaoh. It should have been recognized right then and there that God’s power was greater and they must listen to Moses and Aaron. But the truth is that unbelief is not a matter of evidence. Sinner will not believe in the biblical God and His Christ if they just have more evidence, or more education, or more signs. Unbelief is rebellion against God and that is plain here. So the victory of God is seen in Aaron’s staff swallowing the Egyptians’ staffs. The Egyptians thought they won by showing they could do the same miracle, but they did not take into account the fact that God would swallow them up.
Herein we also see a picture of the prophets said of the King of Egypt, that God would give him as food to the beasts of the earth. Here the power of Egypt is given as food. The Hebrews will pick and plunder from the Egyptians as they are left for dead. The serpents of Egypt or defeated and eaten, they should’ve recognized this to be a sign that Egypt and Pharaoh are over and done.
Note here that not only were the serpents of the sorcerers eaten up by Aaron’s staff, but this means that not only were the serpents eaten, but the wise men, sorcerers, and magicians of Egypt also lost their staffs. This was like being completed disarmed and humiliated – like a man being stripped of his gun or his badge. Even more serious than humiliation to these men, it was a sign that power and authority was being taken from them. Staffs were a sign of authority and power, and theirs was taken from them by being eaten alive. The authority they had over the Hebrew slaves was being taken from them and being given to Moses and Aaron as God’s servants.
In all of this, as the good serpent eats the multiple bad serpents we see the great gospel theme that death is swallowed up in victory. As Jesus Christ bore our sin, death, and curse, to His death on the cross, death ran itself through when Christ died, like a great dragon opening his mouth to swallow a knight, but in so doing exposed his open throat as his only weak spot where the knight runs him through – death is swallowed up in victory! “O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory? The sting of death is sin; and the power of sin is the law. But thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.”
As nasty and dark and powerful are the powers of sin, the enemy, and darkness, they are no match for the power of Jesus Christ, and His death and resurrection which has disarmed them all. Sinners should know that since Christ rose from the dead, that is like Aaron’s staff swallowing up the magicians’ staffs. It is all but over. The victory is God’s and the serpent has no future. The destruction of the Hebrew boys years earlier was a battle over the future, and now God is showing Egypt that they have lost the battle for the future.
But Pharaoh’s heart was hardened, he would not listen to them. Pharaoh was under judgment from God. Not only Pharaoh, but interestingly the Apostle Paul mentions two men believed to be two of the sorcerers of Egypt. Paul, in 2 Timothy 3, is describing certain ungodly men, and he compares them to Jannes and Jambres, who are the sorcerers of Egypt according to extra biblical Jewish teaching which apparently is accurate on this point of history. In 2 Timothy 3 Paul says, “Just as Jannes and Jambres opposed Moses, so these men also oppose the truth, men corrupted in mind and disqualified regarding the faith. But they will not get very far, for their folly will be plain to all, as was that of those two men.”
If you hear His voice today, do not harden your heart. Do not oppose the truth. Opposing the truth will get you swallowed up and eaten alive. Do not be corrupted in mind, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. As Jannes and Jambres, opposing the truth, holding on to your sin, refusing to repent, will not get you very far, and your folly will be plain to all as was that of those two men. Rebellion against the Word of God will cost you your life, it is great folly, as was evident to all when Aaron’s staff swallowed theirs. Yet they did not obey. But Moses and Aaron obeyed all that the LORD commanded them. And so did Jesus Christ who became sin for us that we might become the righteousness of God in Him; and so that death might be swallowed up in victory, and we might be freed from our sin and granted eternal life. So come and welcome to Jesus Christ.
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