“He turned their waters into blood

And he caused their fish to die.”

(Psalm 105:29)

Much as we saw in the previous verse, God is taking apart those things that the people of Egypt worshipped. The Nile River always has been the source of life for Egypt; in the plague, God turned it into a source of death. Not only can blood not sustain fishwife, it also cannot water crops or provide water for the people. And this plague, the first of the ten, affected not just the Nile, but all water in the land of Egypt. 

The Egyptian god Khnum was the god of the Nile, of water, and of procreation. And, as we saw with Amun-Ra, their false gods cannot resist the power of the Almighty God of the universe. As we have noted, God is bringing low those gods that were served in Egypt — remember, this is a demonstration of power not just to the Egyptians, but to the Israelites who had fallen into the idolatry of the people around them (Joshua 24:14).

Even today, our human hearts have a bent toward idolatry. We lean toward it and subtly permit elements of it in our lives — sometimes it is not so subtle! Worse yet, we often incorporate it into our worship. This goes beyond the icons of Eastern Orthodoxy or the idols of the Roman church. In fact, anytime we incorporate things in worship apart from what God has explicitly commanded, we have embraced a form of idolatry. Whether this be images of Jesus that we scatter around our churches or homes, choosing to sing humanistic songs, importing art and drama into the service, or just simply engaging in things that manipulate the minds and hearts of the participants to a certain end. It is idolatry because it is not trusting God to lay out in His Word how we are to worship. And God will bring idolatry low, even today. We may not see chalices of water turn into blood, but He will bring the downfall of those who do not honor Him in all things.