Exodus 7 — The Staff, the Serpent, and the Nile Turned to Blood

Today’s Passage: Exodus 7

Here the long contest between the LORD and Pharaoh truly begins, and I would have you read it as the opening of a battle that God has already promised to win. Moses has protested that he is a poor speaker and no match for the mightiest throne on earth, and God’s answer is not to make Moses grand but to make him God’s own voice: See, I have made you like God to Pharaoh, and Aaron will be your prophet. Then comes the first sign, a shepherd’s staff thrown down that becomes a serpent writhing on the palace floor, and when Pharaoh’s magicians throw down their own staffs and copy the wonder, Aaron’s serpent swallows theirs whole, the first quiet word that Egypt’s power is no power at all beside the God of the Hebrews. And when Pharaoh will still not bend, God reaches out and strikes the very heart of Egypt, the river Nile, the lifeline of the whole land and a god they worshiped, and turns it to blood, so that the fish die and the water stinks and a nation stands helpless before a river it cannot drink. Through all of it one purpose runs like a thread of iron: that Egypt and Israel alike will know that He is the LORD. Hold that near as you read, because everything in this chapter, the staff and the serpent and the blood, is aimed at teaching a proud nation and a doubting people the same lesson, that the God of Abraham is the only God there is.

As you read, hold this: The LORD struck Egypt’s river and swallowed its magic to prove that He alone is God, and that Egypt and Israel would know it.

Exodus 7:1-5 (BSB)

¹ The LORD answered Moses, “See, I have made you like God to Pharaoh, and your brother Aaron will be your prophet. ² You are to speak all that I command you, and your brother Aaron is to tell Pharaoh to let the Israelites go out of his land. ³ But I will harden Pharaoh’s heart, and though I will 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 by mighty acts of judgment I will bring the divisions of My people the Israelites out of the land of Egypt. ⁵ And the Egyptians will know that I am the LORD, when I stretch out My hand against Egypt and bring the Israelites out from among them.”

See how God answers a frightened man. Moses had just finished protesting that he was unfit, slow of speech, sure to be ignored by the king. God does not scold him and does not flatter him. He simply lifts him up into a place far higher than Moses ever imagined for himself: I have made you like God to Pharaoh, and Aaron will be your prophet. The trembling shepherd who felt too small to open his mouth is told that when he speaks, it will be as though God Himself were speaking, and Pharaoh will hear the word of heaven from his lips. This is God’s way with weak servants, not to make them strong in themselves, but to stand behind them so wholly that their weakness no longer decides anything.

Then God tells Moses the shape of the whole struggle before it begins, and there is deep mercy in that honesty. Pharaoh will not listen, He says. The signs and wonders will be multiplied, and still the king will refuse, and only after mighty acts of judgment will Israel be brought out. Moses is not sent out with a rosy promise that the first request will be granted. He is told plainly that the road runs through hardness and refusal and a long trial of patience, so that when Pharaoh says no, and says it again, Moses will not be shaken, for he will know that every refusal is falling out exactly as God foretold. And notice the great goal set at the end of it all, stated twice for weight: that the Egyptians will know that I am the LORD. The whole terrible contest has a purpose larger than one nation’s freedom. It is that a watching world would learn who the true God is.

Exodus 7:6-7 (BSB)

⁶ So Moses and Aaron did just as the LORD had commanded them. ⁷ Moses was eighty years old and Aaron was eighty-three when they spoke to Pharaoh.

Do not hurry past these two short verses, for they carry a quiet glory. Moses and Aaron did just as the LORD had commanded them. After all the objections at the burning bush, after all the fear and the reluctance, when the moment finally comes the two brothers simply obey. There is no more arguing recorded here, only two old men squaring their shoulders and walking into the presence of the most powerful king on earth because God has told them to. That is faith come down out of the clouds and into the feet, the plain willingness to do the next thing God has said even when the outcome is hidden and the danger is real.

And the Spirit takes care to tell us their ages, and it is worth pausing over. Moses was eighty and Aaron eighty-three when they stood before Pharaoh. These are not young men with a lifetime of strength ahead of them, brimming with confidence and fire. They are old men, at an age when most would think their useful days long behind them, and it is precisely then that God calls them to the greatest work of their lives. Let no one tell you that you are too far along in your years for God to use. The God who sent an eighty-year-old shepherd to topple an empire is not finished with anyone who is still willing to obey.

Exodus 7:8-13 (BSB)

⁸ The LORD said to Moses and Aaron, ⁹ “When Pharaoh tells you, ‘Perform a miracle,’ you are to say to Aaron, ‘Take your staff and throw it down before Pharaoh,’ and it will become a serpent.” ¹⁰ So Moses and Aaron went to Pharaoh and did just as the LORD had commanded. Aaron threw his staff down before Pharaoh and his officials, and it became a serpent. ¹¹ But Pharaoh called the wise men and sorcerers and magicians of Egypt, and they also did the same things by their magic arts. ¹² Each one threw down his staff, and it became a serpent. But Aaron’s staff swallowed up the other staffs. ¹³ Still, Pharaoh’s heart was hardened, and he would not listen to them, just as the LORD had said.

Now the first sign is given, and watch closely what happens, because the whole war is pictured in it. Aaron throws down the staff before Pharaoh and his court, and it becomes a serpent twisting on the marble floor. It is a marvel, but Pharaoh is not impressed, for he has men of his own. He calls in the wise men and the sorcerers and the magicians of Egypt, and they throw down their staffs, and by their dark arts their staffs become serpents too. Here is a hard truth we must face plainly: the powers arrayed against God are not always empty tricks. There is a real counterfeit in this world, a genuine imitation that can copy the works of God closely enough to deceive, and Egypt’s magicians were able to mimic the sign well enough that Pharaoh could tell himself nothing had changed.

But look what the God of Israel does next, and let it settle every fear you have of the counterfeit. Aaron’s staff swallowed up the other staffs. The serpents of Egypt’s magicians, the very symbols of the king’s own crowned power, were devoured whole by the serpent of God. The imitation could rise for a moment, but it could not stand; it was consumed. This is the true measure of every power that sets itself against the LORD. It may copy His works and strut for an hour, but in the end it is swallowed up, and only the LORD is left standing. And yet, even with the proof lying plain on the floor before him, Pharaoh’s heart was hardened and he would not listen, just as the LORD had said. He had seen enough to know the truth and chose the counterfeit anyway, for a hard heart is not moved by evidence but only made harder by it.

Exodus 7:14-18 (BSB)

¹⁴ Then the LORD said to Moses, “Pharaoh’s heart is unyielding; he refuses to let the people go. ¹⁵ Go to Pharaoh in the morning as you see him walking out to the water. Wait on the bank of the Nile to meet him, and take in your hand the staff that was changed into a snake. ¹⁶ Then say to him, ‘The LORD, the God of the Hebrews, has sent me to tell you: Let My people go, so that they may worship Me in the wilderness. But until now you have not listened. ¹⁷ This is what the LORD says: By this you will know that I am the LORD. Behold, with the staff in my hand I will strike the water of the Nile, and it will turn to blood. ¹⁸ The fish in the Nile will die, the river will stink, and the Egyptians will be unable to drink its water.’”

The sign of the serpent has not bent the king, and so God moves from a wonder that could be imitated to a plague that strikes at the very life of Egypt. Notice where God sends Moses to meet him: in the morning, at the water, on the bank of the Nile. Pharaoh is going down to the river, very likely to honor it, for the Nile was worshiped as a giver of life, and it is there, at the god’s own bank, that God will confront him. There is a fitting justice in it. The place where Egypt bowed to the river is the place where God will show that the river is nothing in His hand. And once more Moses is to carry the same patient, unwavering demand: Let My people go, so that they may worship Me in the wilderness. Every plague is preceded by that word of grace, one more chance to obey before judgment falls.

And hear again the reason God gives for the blow that is coming: By this you will know that I am the LORD. This is not vengeance for its own sake but revelation, God teaching a hardened king by the only lesson he will finally feel. Behold, God says, with the staff I will strike the water of the Nile, and it will turn to blood, and the fish will die, and the river will stink, and Egypt will not be able to drink. Think of what that meant to a land that lived and breathed by this river. The Nile was their drink, their food, their harvest, their whole confidence, and God announces that He will lay His hand on it and make it a river of death. When God strikes the thing a nation trusts in place of Him, He is not being cruel; He is being merciful in the hardest way, tearing away the false god so that they might at last look up to the true One.

Exodus 7:19-21 (BSB)

¹⁹ And the LORD said to Moses, “Tell Aaron, ‘Take your staff and stretch out your hand over the waters of Egypt—over their rivers and canals and ponds and all the reservoirs—that they may become blood.’ There will be blood throughout the land of Egypt, even in the vessels of wood and stone.” ²⁰ Moses and Aaron did just as the LORD had commanded; in the presence of Pharaoh and his officials, Aaron raised the staff and struck the water of the Nile, and all the water was turned to blood. ²¹ The fish in the Nile died, and the river smelled so bad that the Egyptians could not drink its water. And there was blood throughout the land of Egypt.

See how far the judgment reaches, for God spares nothing that held Egypt’s water. It is not only the great river but the canals and the ponds and the reservoirs, every stream and pool and standing jar, even the water already drawn into vessels of wood and stone. There is blood throughout the whole land of Egypt. When the LORD rises to judge a false god, He does it thoroughly, leaving no corner where a man might still cup his hands and pretend the river still lived. The very thing Egypt had trusted for life is turned, from one end of the land to the other, into a sign of death.

And once again the Bible pauses to tell us that Moses and Aaron did just as the LORD had commanded. Aaron lifts the staff in the sight of Pharaoh and his officials and strikes the water, and it all turns to blood. The fish die, the river stinks, and a whole nation that once looked on this river as its life now cannot bear to drink of it. I want you to feel the terrible reversal in that. The god they worshiped has become a horror to them; the source of their food has become a grave for its own fish; the water they praised has turned foul in their mouths. This is what every idol finally does to those who trust it. It promises life and gives death, and only the God who made the waters can be trusted to give life that does not turn to blood.

Exodus 7:22-25 (BSB)

²² But the magicians of Egypt did the same things by their magic arts. So Pharaoh’s heart was hardened, and he would not listen to Moses and Aaron, just as the LORD had said. ²³ Instead, Pharaoh turned around, went into his palace, and did not take any of this to heart. ²⁴ So all the Egyptians dug around the Nile for water to drink, because they could not drink the water from the river. ²⁵ And seven full days passed after the LORD had struck the Nile.

Here at the end we meet the counterfeit one last time, and we see how a hard heart uses it. The magicians of Egypt did the same things by their magic arts, and so Pharaoh’s heart was hardened (חֲזַק) chazaq, pronounced khah-ZAK. Strong's H2388, to be strong, grip tight, fasten firmly. This word runs through the whole plague story like a dark thread, and it is worth understanding well. At root the word means “to be strong, to strengthen, to make firm or hard,” and it is the word behind much of the hardening of Pharaoh’s heart in Exodus, standing behind verses 13 and 22, “Pharaoh’s heart was hardened.” Now here is what we must say plainly, neither softening it nor pretending to see further than we are shown. Scripture speaks of this hardening in two ways, and it holds them both together without apology. In some places the LORD says, “I will harden Pharaoh’s heart,” as He does at the very start of this chapter in verse 3. In other places we are told simply that Pharaoh’s heart was hard, that he hardened it himself, that he would not listen and did not take it to heart. Both are true. God, in His sovereign purpose, gave Pharaoh over to the hardness the king was choosing, and Pharaoh, in his own guilty pride, kept choosing it freely and answered for it justly. The Bible never lets us use the one truth to excuse the other. Pharaoh is never a helpless victim, for he loved his refusal; and God is never merely a bystander, for even the king’s rebellion served the purpose God had announced beforehand, that His power would be displayed and His name proclaimed in all the earth. We are not told how these two run together in the deep places of God’s counsel. We are told only to fear a heart that will not bend, and to bow before a God who reigns even over the rebellion of kings. . Look carefully at what the king does with this. He does not ask how his men might turn a little more water to blood when the whole country is already ruined; he seizes on the imitation as an excuse to keep refusing. A hard heart will always find a reason. Give it a hundred proofs of God and it will fasten on the one shadow of a counterfeit and call the matter settled. The magicians could copy the plague, but they could not cure it, they could not turn one drop of that blood back into water, and Pharaoh did not care to notice, because he did not want to.

And then the saddest line in the chapter, quietly told: Pharaoh turned around, went into his palace, and did not take any of this to heart. He walked away. With his nation digging desperately along the riverbanks for a little clean water, with the fish rotting and the river stinking under judgment, the king simply turned his back and went indoors and let it not touch him. That is the deepest danger of a hardened heart, not that it cannot see, but that it will not feel; it looks upon the plain hand of God and shrugs and goes home. Meanwhile the ordinary people dug all around the Nile for water, and seven full days passed under the weight of that first blow. God had struck, and He had given a whole week for the lesson to sink in, patient even in judgment, still waiting to be known as the LORD.