Hunkering Down

The Israelites were protected from the Plague of the Firstborn because they followed the Lord’s instructions to put some of the blood from their sacrificed lamb on the sides and tops of the door-frames of the houses where they ate the lambs. The movie The Ten Commandments gives us a visual of the Israelites safe and closeted in their homes when the plague arrived. Moses said, “This is what the LORD says: ‘About midnight I will go throughout Egypt. Every firstborn son in Egypt will die, from the firstborn son of Pharaoh, who sits on the throne, to the firstborn son of the slave girl, who is at her hand mill, and all the firstborn of the cattle as well. There will be loud wailing throughout Egypt—worse than there has ever been or ever will be again” (Exodus 11:4-6 NIV). Because of COVID-19, this may be the closest any of us come to experiencing what the Israelites went through as they were hunkered down. The good news is the wailing we hear in this pandemic will not be as bad as that heard throughout Egypt.