Exodus 11:5-7 - Homiletics

The issues of life and death are in the hand of God.

For the most part there is, or there seems to be, one event to the righteous and to the wicked ( Ecclesiastes 9:2 ). Death happens alike to all, and does not appear to choose his victims on any principle of sparing good and punishing ill desert. War, famine, pestilence, sweep away equally the good and the bad. This is the general law of God's providence; but he makes occasional exceptions. The issues of life and death are really his. Not a sparrow falls to the ground without our Father. If he see fit, he can "put a difference" between his own people and others. He can strike with death whomsoever he pleases; he can spare those whom he chooses to spare. We see him here:—

I. MAKING DEATH AN INSTRUMENT OF VENGEANCE , NOT ON THOSE WHO DIE , BUT ON THOSE WHO SURVIVE . Pharaoh is punished, and the Egyptians generally are punished, by the sudden death of the first-born. They had deserved this retribution by their cruelty to the Hebrews, and especially by the drowning of the Hebrew male children ( Exodus 1:22 ). It afflicted all, however, alike, whether they had taken part in the above-mentioned cruelties or not. This was because it was a national chastisement; and the case had been the same with almost all the other plagues.

II. STRIKING TERROR INTO A WHOLE COMMUNITY BY VISITING WITH DEATH A CERTAIN NUMBER . Death is the main fear of worldly men. Anything else may be endured, made up for, made the best of. But for death there is no help, no remedy. The awful phantom is, as far as possible, kept out of sight, unthought of, unprepared for, thrust into the background. Men live as if they had a freehold of life, not a leasehold. When the gaunt spectre draws near; when, in the shape of cholera or fever, he makes his entrance upon the scene and challenges attention, the result is, for the most part, a panic. So it was in Egypt. The Egyptians wrote much of death, reminded each other of death (Herod. 2:78), prepared tombs for themselves with great care speculated largely upon the condition of souls in another world; but it would seem that they shrank, as much as ordinary men, from near contact with the grisly phantom. It was now about to be suddenly brought home to them how thin a barrier separates between the two worlds. In the presence of death they would wake up to the realities of life. They would be conquered, submissive, ready to do whatever was God's will. Some such results are traceable whenever and wherever imminent death threatens a large number, and are to be watched for by the minister, who will find his opportunity at such seasons, and should take advantage of it.

III. SHOWING HIS FAVOUR TO HIS OWN PEOPLE BY EXEMPTING THEM WHOLLY FROM THE VISITATION . Against the Israelites not even a dog would move his tongue ( Exodus 11:7 ). With mortality all around them, with a corpse in each Egyptian house, with animals lying dead on all sides, in the open country as well as in the towns and houses, they would be completely free from the visitation; a special providence would save and protect them. Such an exemption was, of course, miraculous, and is well nigh unparalleled. But still there have been cases where God's people have suffered marvellously little in a time of pestilence, when it has seemed to strike almost none but reckless and vicious lives, when an arm has appeared to be extended over the righteous. At such times what praise and gratitude are not due to God for "putting a difference between the Egyptians and Israel!" He spares when we deserve punishment, and in his wrath thinks upon mercy. He gives a token of his approval to men of regular lives and temperate habits, by "passing them over" when he walks through the land dealing out destruction.