Animals, Colors, Metals, Numbers and Signs in Scripture.

Ten and Law or Commandment

The Ten Plagues of Egypt

The time came according to the promise to Abraham that God sent his servant Moses to deliver the children of Israel out of Egyptian bondage.  There arose a Pharaoh, who knew not Joseph, and he afflicted the children of Israel with grievous and hard bondage.  God sent Moses and Aaron to deliver God's commandment to Pharaoh to let the children of Israel go and serve Him. 

Ten times God commanded Pharaoh to let the children of Israel go and ten times Pharaoh hardened his heart and refused to let the children of Israel go.  After each refusal, God sent a plague upon Egypt.  The ten plagues were these:

1.  Water turned to blood

2.  Frogs over all the land

3.  Lice

4.  Flies

5.  Murrain and death of livestock

6.  Blains and boils on the bodies

7.  Hail

8.  Locusts

9.  Darkness over all the land

10. Death of the firstborn.

According to Heb. 2:2, "every transgression and disobedience received a just recompense of reward."  Beginning with Adam, God has pronounced judgment upon sin.  The wages of sin is death.  God brings every sin to his bar of justice and executes judgment against it.  There is no such thing as anyone ever getting away with a single sin before God.  Every sin is punished. 

The plagues of Egypt declare unto us that God will not be mocked and that disobedience to his commandments is a gravely serious matter before God.  Yet in these plagues, we also see the grace of God.    

In the last plague, God's grace is abundantly manifest to his elect children.  Ex. 11:4 "And Moses said, Thus saith the LORD, About midnight will I go out into the midst of Egypt: 5 And all the firstborn in the land of Egypt shall die, from the firstborn of Pharaoh that sitteth upon his throne, even unto the firstborn of the maidservant that is behind the mill; and all the firstborn of beasts. 6 And there shall be a great cry throughout all the land of Egypt, such as there was none like it, nor shall be like it any more. 7 But against any of the children of Israel shall not a dog move his tongue, against man or beast: that ye may know how that the LORD doth put a difference between the Egyptians and Israel."

In executing the death of the firstborn in the land of Egypt, God's justice was still satisfied both upon the Egyptians and upon the children of Israel.  We may ask, "How was God's justice satisfied upon the children of Israel as none of the firstborn of the Israelites died that night?"  The answer is found in the ordinance of the Passover lamb.  Under the Passover ordinance, each house of the children of Israel was to take a lamb and keep it penned up from the tenth day of the first month  until the fourteenth day of the first month and then to sacrifice it in the evening of the fourteenth day.  The blood of the Passover lamb was to be sprinkled on the upper doorpost and the two side posts of all the houses of the children of Israel.  God would Passover all the houses in which there was blood sprinkled on the upper doorpost and the two side posts.

The Passover lamb was a figure of Jesus Christ.  He is the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the elect world.  The Passover lamb was to be penned on the tenth day.  This shows us in type that Christ came under the law: Gal. 4:4 "But when the fulness of the time was come, God sent forth his Son, made of a woman, made under the law, 5 To redeem them that were under the law, that we might receive the adoption of sons."  Christ came under the law and kept the law to a jot and a tittle and because he was without sin and perfect in every detail, he was the perfect Passover Lamb to satisfy the just demands of God to suffer God's punishment of the sins of the elect on behalf of the elect. 

Just as the children of Israel were passed over in judgment, so the elect of God are passed over in judgment as the judgment of their sins was satisfied in the person of Jesus Christ who suffered for us that he might redeem us to God.

The Wrath of God 

The term, "wrath of God," appears ten times in the scriptures and shows forth God's great displeasure against man's disobedience of his commandments:

1.  Ps. 78:31 "The wrath of God came upon them, and slew the fattest of them, and smote down the chosen men of Israel."

2.  John 3:36 "He that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life: and he that believeth not the Son shall not see life; but the wrath of God abideth on him."

3.  Rom 1:18 "For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who hold the truth in unrighteousness;"

4.  Eph 5:6 "Let no man deceive you with vain words: for because of these things cometh the wrath of God upon the children of disobedience."

5.  Col 3:6 "For which things' sake the wrath of God cometh on the children of disobedience:"

6.  Rev 14:10 "The same shall drink of the wine of the wrath of God, which is poured out without mixture into the cup of his indignation; and he shall be tormented with fire and brimstone in the presence of the holy angels, and in the presence of the Lamb:"

7.  Rev 14:19 "And the angel thrust in his sickle into the earth, and gathered the vine of the earth, and cast it into the great winepress of the wrath of God."

8.  Rev 15:1 "And I saw another sign in heaven, great and marvellous, seven angels having the seven last plagues; for in them is filled up the wrath of God."

9.  Rev 15:7 "And one of the four beasts gave unto the seven angels seven golden vials full of the wrath of God, who liveth for ever and ever."

10. Rev 16:1 "And I heard a great voice out of the temple saying to the seven angels, Go your ways, and pour out the vials of the wrath of God upon the earth."

From the above we can conclude that God's wrath is manifest both in an eternal judgment and in timely judgments.  In eternal judgments, God's wrath against his broken laws is manifest against the "children of disobedience, and God's wrath was manifest against the sins of the elect at the cross when the Lamb of God (Jesus Christ) suffered God's wrath poured out without measure to satisfy God's judgment against the elect.  We also see the wrath of God manifest in timely judgments as when the children of Israel had rebelled against the commandments of God in the wilderness.    

Instrument of Ten Strings

Three verses of scripture speak specifically of an instrument of ten strings:

    1.  Psa 33:2 "Praise the LORD with harp: sing unto him with the psaltery and an instrument of ten strings."

    2.  Psa 92:3 "Upon an instrument of ten strings, and upon the psaltery; upon the harp with a solemn sound."

    3.  Psa 144:9 "I will sing a new song unto thee, O God: upon a psaltery and an instrument of ten strings will I sing praises unto thee."

The above verses tell us that the instrument of ten strings is the harp.  The harp and the psaltery are often linked together in the book of Psalms.  The psaltery is defined as "the truth" in Ps. 71:22 "I will also praise thee with the psaltery, even thy truth, O my God: unto thee will I sing with the harp, O thou Holy One of Israel."  The harp, the instrument of ten strings is the instrument identified in Psalms to sing with. 

In Revelations, we read of the harp as follows:

    1.  Rev. 14:2 "And I heard a voice from heaven, as the voice of many waters, and as the voice of a great thunder: and I heard the voice of harpers harping with their harps: 3 And they sung as it were a new song before the throne, and before the four beasts, and the elders: and no man could learn that song but the hundred and forty and four thousand, which were redeemed from the earth."

    2.  Rev. 15:2 "And I saw as it were a sea of glass mingled with fire: and them that had gotten the victory over the beast, and over his image, and over his mark, and over the number of his name, stand on the sea of glass, having the harps of God. 3 And they sing the song of Moses the servant of God, and the song of the Lamb, saying, Great and marvellous are thy works, Lord God Almighty; just and true are thy ways, thou King of saints."

The harpers sang the new song of redemption and they sang the song of Moses the servant of God and the song of the Lamb.  Thus, they were singing about both timely and eternal deliverances.  There is only one instrument that we are told to sing with in the New Testament and that is the "heart:" Eph 5:19 "Speaking to yourselves in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody in your heart to the Lord."  The heart is the antitype to which the harp is a type. 

Often we hear of the term, "heart strings," which is reference to the heart being the instrument of ten strings.  Since ten is associated with the laws and commandments of God, we would expect that the heart would have the laws of God written on it:

    1.  Heb. 8:10 "For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, saith the Lord; I will put my laws into their mind, and write them in their hearts: and I will be to them a God, and they shall be to me a people."

    2.  Heb. 10:16 "This is the covenant that I will make with them after those days, saith the Lord, I will put my laws into their hearts, and in their minds will I write them."

    3.  Rom. 2:14 "For when the Gentiles, which have not the law, do by nature the things contained in the law, these, having not the law, are a law unto themselves: 15 Which show the work of the law written in their hearts, their conscience also bearing witness, and their thoughts the mean while accusing or else excusing one another." 

    4.  2 Cor. 3:3 "Forasmuch as ye are manifestly declared to be the epistle of Christ ministered by us, written not with ink, but with the Spirit of the living God; not in tables of stone, but in fleshly tables of the heart."

From the above we gather that when a person is born of the Spirit of God that God writes his laws in their heart and in their mind with the finger of God (Spirit of the living God) and this is a direct writing of God.  This is in comparison to when God wrote the ten commandments on two tables of stone with the finger of God.  Now the laws of God are written directly into the hearts of God's elect. 

Therefore, it is with the heart, that has the commandments of God written therein, that we sing the new song of redemption giving all the praise, honor, and glory unto God.  The elect are indeed harpers harping with their harps.