People do some things in the Bible that leave you wondering why. On one such occasion, the Egyptians were two plagues into a ten-plague stretch. Frogs were everywhere, and there was no escaping them. When the time had come, Moses appeared before the pharaoh and said, “The honor is yours to tell me: when shall I entreat for you and your servants and your people, that the frogs be destroyed from you and your houses, that they may be left only in the Nile” (Ex. 8:9)? I can’t speak for anyone else, but I am sure I would have said, “Now and don’t delay!” Pharaoh said, “Tomorrow” (Ex. 8:10). What!?! Frogs are crawling all over the throne room. Moses is kicking them out of the way while he speaks to the pharaoh and he says, “Meh, tomorrow is good.” Maybe it was pride or stubbornness that explains why he would have delayed the relief of his people. They did die on the morrow, “The LORD did according to the word of Moses, and the frogs died out of the houses, the courts, and the fields. So, they piled them in heaps, and the land became foul” (Ex. 8:13-14). A single dead frog is a special kind of stench. I can’t imagine what millions would smell like. Pharaoh postponed the relief of all this for a day.
Is there anything that we do today that might be similar? We are not dealing with an invasion of frogs. However, there could be pestilence in our lives that God could help us with, and we keep saying, “Meh, tomorrow sounds good.” Our “frog” could be a habitual sin, relationship issue with a brother or sister, anger, pride, covetousness, lust, hypocrisy and the list could go on like a Sally Struthers infomercial. The point is our land is covered in “frogs.”
God told His people, “If…my people who are called by My name humble themselves and pray and seek My face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, will forgive their sin and will heal their land” (2 Chron. 7:14). The frogs that we are dealing with can be handled with prayer and seeking God. Following after Him and walking as He walks, “For you were formerly darkness, but now you are Light in the Lord; walk as children of Light (for the fruit of the Light consists in all goodness and righteousness and truth), trying to learn what is pleasing to the Lord” (Eph. 5:8-10). We have what Pharaoh could never have. We can plead to the God of heaven without Moses. We have a God that is waiting to help us clean out the frogs from our lives. “No temptation has overtaken you but such as is common to man; and God is faithful, who will not allow you to be tempted beyond what you are able, but with the temptation will provide the way of escape also, so that you will be able to endure it” (1 Cor. 10:13). Don’t wait and put off for tomorrow the blessings God has promised us for today and right now.