Boils

Exodus 9:8-12

Many times throughout life, people go through pain and suffering. In Exodus, the Egyptians went through many plagues, all to show them that God was the one in control, not Pharaoh. Each and every plague had its reason and purpose, and a meaning behind it.

In Exodus 9:8-12, we find the sixth plague, boils. Boils are extremely painful, red, tender pus-filled lumps. They weren’t a very pleasant thing to have, but God was going to use them to try to speak something to the Egyptians. The Egyptians were, at the time, serving false gods, instead of the one true God. One of their gods was Isis, the goddess of fertility, life, and healing. God gave them boils, and their god couldn't heal them. God was calling the Egyptians to see that only God can truly heal. Isis couldn’t heal their boils, let alone their hearts. However, the Egyptians still wouldn’t see that the God of Israel was the one in control, and not their gods, goddesses, and even Pharaoh.

In many of the other plagues, Pharaoh had the magicians try to imitate the plagues. However, this is one they didn’t imitate, nor could they. Exodus 9:11 says, “And the magicians could not stand before Moses because of the boils, for the boils were on the magicians and on all the Egyptians.” The magicians couldn’t escape or “trick” their way out of having the boils. In life, we can think that we have all the “tricks” to somehow escape the judgment of God. We can think we are invisible or that nothing bad could ever happen to us. However, no one can escape judgment, just as the magicians couldn’t escape the boils.

Painful boils will come into our lives, and our hearts will continue to be hardened as the Egyptians were, if we do not heed the Word of God. He can heal all of our “boils” and our hearts!

~ Jillian Krauser