The Lord tells Moses to tell Aaron to stretch out his staff and make frogs come up over the land.

Aaron does. Of course, he can’t make frogs appear and neither can his wooden stick. It happened at the Lord’s command as Moses and Aaron obeyed God’s word to them.

Pharaoh calls for Moses, and Pharaoh commands them to plead with the Lord to make the frogs go away. His magicians can only do what people do best, make it worse. They multiply the curse and create more frogs. Pharaoh knows he needs the God of the Hebrews to make the frogs go away.

We don’t hear the Lord command this next part. When Moses is before Pharaoh, Moses tells Pharaoh to pick when he wants the frogs to go away. I don’t know if Pharaoh thinks it’s too much to ask God to take them away immediately, but he says, “Tomorrow God can remove the frogs.” Moses boldly says that tomorrow the frogs will be gone so that Pharaoh might know that there is no one like God. God is revealing Himself. God wants people to know Him, to know who He is. He wants the Egyptians to know He is God.

Moses keeps his word with Pharaoh and cries out to God. God makes the frogs all die. God hadn’t commanded Moses to ask when Pharaoh wanted the frogs to die off. Moses asked and promised to deliver, but he did so to defend God’s name and honor, to bring glory to God.

The Bible says, “The Lord did according to the word of Moses.” It sounds opposite. Usually, it’s someone doing something according to the word of the Lord. God heard Moses’ statement, and God made good on Moses’ word. He confirmed the word of His servant, something the apostles in the New Testament ask and trust God to do. It’s like David boldly claiming victory over Goliath and Elijah challenging the prophets of Baal. It’s like Paul proclaiming that Elymas would be blind for a season.

God’s children spoke in His name and for the honor and glory of God, and God acted according to their words. You could describe it with the phrase from Jude, “Contend earnestly for the faith.” A contender fights and doesn’t back down. He holds his ground. That brings us back to abiding, digging into who we know God to be and not allowing ourselves to be moved, no matter what mountain of frogs or anything else we see in our way.