He sat on his elegant furniture, in his fabulous house, surrounded by the glories of a wealthy nation, attended by efficient servants, powerful enough to command just about anything. But today he was miserable, miserable beyond words, because everywhere he looked they were there. In his way, spoiling his view, interrupting his conversations, disturbing his thoughts, menacing his health. Everywhere.
Frogs. Slimy, goggle-eyed frogs, jumping and jostling one another. Frogs everywhere. In the house, in every room of the house. On every stick of furniture. He could not sit down without chasing them off his chair. He could not lie in his bed, because they pounced in with him. He could not take a bath, for they swam in his tub and they bounced in his basin.
The last straw was the kitchen. Frogs in the kitchen. Frogs in the cupboards, frogs in the pantry, frogs in the ovens, banging against the sides with their legs, trying to jump out -- and, when they tried turning up the heat, the bump-bump-bump, instead of stopping, became bumpety-bumpety-bumpety-bumpety - a ceaseless and frantic pounding that in itself gave you a headache if you stood by too long.
The frogs even got into the pots and pans. Some idiot in the kitchen suggested that tonight’s menu should be braised frog’s legs, garnished with fried frog’s eggs, and for dessert, sweet little froggy tails. What a disgusting mess! Frogs. Nothing but frogs.
And it did not matter that the master of the house was the Pharaoh of Upper and Lower Egypt, whom his people called the living sun-god. It did not matter that he could dispatch armies up the Nile and into the far reaches of Africa or out the coastal roads to Palestine. It did not matter that Pharaoh’s very name caused men to tremble, that he had enslaved thousands to build him a pyramid worthy of his majesty. None of this mattered, because of these tiny, ugly, smelly, noisy beasts, fresh from the water of the Nile. Frogs!
So Pharaoh, in desperation, called for prayer. He reached out and summoned Moses and Aaron, the leaders of the poorest of the poor, the spiritual leaders of the nobody Hebrews, and he asked for prayer. When you have a plague in your midst, no matter how powerful you are, you find out that there is a power with greater than you. You call for prayer.
He sat on his elegant furniture, in his fabulous house, surrounded by the glories of his wealthy nation, attended by efficient servants, powerful enough to command just about anything. But today he was miserable, miserable beyond words, because everywhere he looked they were there. In his way, spoiling his view, interrupting his conversations, disturbing his thoughts, menacing his health. Everywhere.
Accusations. Stories. Rumors. Signs that everything was collapsing. It looked as though the government was stalled. Nothing productive was happening.
And it did not matter that the master of this house was the President of the United States, who had been re-elected in a landslide. It did not matter that he could dispatch armies to southeast Asia or to rebellious college campuses. It did not matter that millions had voted for him, that various minions had gathered intelligence for him, that others had pulled off “dirty tricks” for him. None of this mattered, because of the newspaper stories, the television reports, the crowds in the streets, the rumbles in the congressional hearing rooms, all these terrors fresh from the Watergate. Frogs again!
So the President, in desperation, called for prayer. He reached out to his advisor, whom he both trusted and feared, and together they fell on their knees, in prayer. With fevered brow and trembling lip, he cried out for prayer. For, you see, when you have a plague in your midst, no matter how powerful you are, you find out that there is a power greater than you. You call for prayer.
Whether it is Egypt thirty-four centuries ago, or the United States in our time, there are plagues in the body politic. But there is also power in prayer.
I
Ours is a nation with plagues. We have problems worse than frogs leaping around. We have plagues like crime, drugs, child abuse, pornography, murder, vandalism, you know the list. I do not need to repeat it. These things are plagues, and we can’t get free from them.
But these plagues have a meaning. There is a way to interpret them. I see these plagues as God’s judgment, God’s judgment on the self-centeredness of those with power, who oppress the powerless.
Ours is a nation with plagues. These plagues stem from the lust for power, so that the powerful crush the spirits of the powerless. When power becomes an end in itself, and the needs of the people are buried under the rhetoric of winning, then you can expect God’s judgment to fall. God’s judgment comes on pride and on greed.
I count myself among those who have listened to the speeches in this year’s election campaigns, and are unable to find clear voices for empowering the powerless or for lifting up the fallen. All I seem to hear are promises to lower our taxes or worse, just appeals to win for the sake of winning. Cheerleading. We’re gonna win, we’re gonna sock it to the Democrats, or we’re gonna bury the Republicans. All that focuses on the wrong things. It focuses on power and position for its own sake. Where is the voice of leadership trying to help the disadvantaged? Who has a program that is not afraid to take on the vested interests? I don’t care whether you are talking about the tobacco industry or the liquor industry or the military arms industry, or whatever, political figures do not stand up to these powers on behalf of the people who are hurting.
And the result is a plague. A plague of illness, a plague of poverty, a plague of drug abuse, a plague of family distress. All of these are God’s judgment on a nation whose leaders just want power! God’s judgment on a nation where, in the words of Vince Lombardi, winning isn’t everything, it’s the only thing!
In ancient Egypt they had an elaborate mythology about Pharaoh. They told him he was the sun-king, the giver of life and death. They told him he was a god. And pretty soon he began to believe them. Pharaoh wasn’t interested in the plight of the Hebrew children. He didn’t care about a few flea-bitten slaves down in Goshen. He was interested in power, just for its own sake. And so Pharaoh got judgment. Pharaoh got plagues. Frogs. Loads of frogs. Judgment comes when power is an end in itself.
II
But now even the politically powerful do sometimes realize when they are in trouble, so they reach out and ask for help. It may be too little, too late; or it may be nothing more than posturing for the favor of the people. But they do sometimes reach out and ask for help. They call for prayer.
When that happens, God’s people must not deny prayer for the politicians. God’s people must respond with prayer, skeptical though we may be, wary though we may be that these folks are insincere. But, because we believe in the sovereignty of God, and because we have tasted the power of prayer, God’s people do not back off of prayer for the nation. God’s people pray anyway.
You see, frogs don’t discriminate. God’s people had just as much trouble with the frogs as the Egyptians did. The frogs didn’t seem to notice what religion you were or what race you were; they just did their froggy thing and jumped all over the good folks as well as the not so good folks. The plagues affected everybody. So you and I, as the people of God, find ourselves caught up in the nation’s problems, just like everyone else. We are not immune. But, unlike everyone else, we do have a weapon; we have the weapon of prayer. The witness of this Scripture is that we are not to withhold that weapon; we are to use it.
When Pharaoh finally was exasperated with the frogs, he sent for Moses and Aaron, and begged them to pray to the Lord about this plague. Do something, do it right away, pray, fellows, pray! Moses agreed, right away, and prayed that the Lord would remove the frogs and cure the land from its plague. He did not hesitate; he did not ask what was in it for him; he did not negotiate with Pharaoh. He just did what faithful people do, he just did the right thing: he prayed. He prayed.
Do you know that prayer is the best thing you and I can do for politics and politicians? We can pray for the will of God to be acknowledged, we can pray for attention to the needs of the people, we can pray that the plagues that infect us may be removed. Don’t feel frustrated; don’t be saying, “There is nothing I can do.” There is something. You can pray. And don’t be hanging your head and crying, “All I can do is pray”, as if prayer were a little thing. It’s not. It’s a real thing. Pray!
In the early days of the Christian church, a group of believers sent a letter to the Roman Emperor. The Emperor had decreed that all the citizens of the Roman empire worship him as a god. Everyone had to go through a ritual of worship in front of his statue. The early Christians would not do this, and they got in trouble for it. But this group wrote the emperor, and they told him that, whatever he thought about them, they wanted him to know that they were the best citizens he had! They were the best citizens he had, because they were praying to a real God for him and his responsibilities, rather than going through a pointless ritual of prayer to him, like most people did, filled with hypocrisy. They knew that when they prayed for the emperor, they were serving him in the most loyal way possible.
Friends, which ever way this election goes, I hope you will not deny your prayers for the victors. I hope you will lift up the president and the congress, the mayor and the council, all of our elected officials. And when (not if, but when), when they mess up (because they will), and when they get too high-and-mighty, when they forget where they came from, when they forget who it is they are supposed to serve, then pray some more. When the plagues come and come again, pray and pray again. Because God keeps on giving us another chance as a nation. God keeps on judging us, but He also keeps on giving us another chance. We made it through slavery and the civil war; we made it through reconstruction and two world wars; we survived through depression and Korea and Vietnam and assassinations and many other things. Whether we will survive drugs and AIDS and child abuse and sexual silliness and all the rest of the frogs I do not know. But I know that we will not make it, if we do not pray for Pharaoh. If we deny our leaders our prayers, I know that we will not survive. If holocaust comes and our civilization falls, part of the blame will fall on the people of God who did not listen to God’s word, “If my people who are called by my name humble themselves, pray, seek my face, and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin and heal their land.”
III
And one more thing. Don’t be discouraged if, even when your prayers are answered, things are not exactly as you would like them to be. Don’t be surprised if your prayers get answered, and there is still a stink to clean up. Don’t be surprised if, as some things are addressed, there is a stink to high heaven. Just like the frogs in the story, where it says that when God took care of the frogs, and they “died in the houses, the courtyards, and the fields, and they gathered them together in heaps, .. the land stank.”
Because the likelihood is that Pharaoh’s heart will be hardened again. There’s a good chance that the powerful will fall in love with power again, and that the needs of the people will get lost again. Piles of dead frogs, but still, “when Pharaoh saw that there was a respite, he hardened his heart, and would not listen to them”. Pharaoh’s heart was hardened, Pharaoh has a short memory, and hopes the people have short memories. But Thomas Jefferson knew that “eternal vigilance is the price of liberty.”
So we will watch and pray. We will watch and pray knowing that politics and plagues go together. We will watch and pray knowing that Pharaohs’ heart will be hardened and he’ll start acting like Pharaoh again. But we will watch and pray anyway.
Conclusion
Why? Because we already know the end of this story. Because we know how this thing is going to come out. Have you read it? You find that before Pharaoh finally freed the people, there were lots more plagues. You find that there were plagues of flies and boils and locusts and thunder and hail and all the rest. The fire next time. We know that.
But we also find that the last plague was the most dreadful of all, when the messenger of death strode through the land and took the flower of its young manhood. We find that the last plague was a plague of death, the likes of which no one had ever expected.
And knowing that, knowing full well about the messenger of death, we will pray. For we’ve read on and we’ve found that one day the messenger of death passed over a capital city, a city of power politics, Jerusalem, and tried to take on the one with all power and authority. For we find that one day he who knew no sin became sin for us. We find that he who was equal with God made himself of no reputation and took upon himself the form of a servant. We find that the powers of evil surrounded him, the pangs of death shot through his soul. We find the song of the crucified, “He has put down the mighty from their seats, and exalted them of low degree; he has filled the hungry with good things, and the rich he has sent empty away.”
We know the end of the story. We know it was for us he hung and suffered there. But we also know He has risen, despite all the plagues of politics, He has risen, He has won. And so, surely, surely has he loved, and we must love him too, and trust in his redeeming blood, and try his works to do.
Prayer is the power that tames the politics and spoils the plagues. Hallelujah; what a Savior!
