The book of Exodus in the Bible takes us to the other side of the world, to Israel in the very old days. The Children of Israel were held captive by the Pharaoh and forced to build pyramids without any straw to make their bricks.

The Lord, in support of Moses, afflicted Egypt with a series of plagues, but for some reason I have never understood “hardened the heart” of the Pharaoh so that he ignored the warning of every plague before the last. “You foreigners don’t understand,”  the Pharaoh said to Moses “We Egyptians are tough and we don’t give up just because we have to suffer a little hardship.” Maybe God just wanted to show off His full repertoire of plagues.

How are we doing in the modern age? Well we can now make bricks without straw, which is some sort of progress, but how about the plagues? Well, you will remember the first one – the river that ran red with blood and killed all the fish. Today we have that all over the world in the form of “red tide”, the blooms of algae which have wiped out the fish from around much of the beautiful Mediterranean sea and many other places. And in many rivers near mining areas mercury creates an equally fatal “silver tide.” Our hearts are still hardened – the pollution goes on.

There are still plenty of plagues of locusts in the world. Not yet in England of the Philippines but with global warning, who knows what we have to look forward to? Actually, in our little village in England, we actually had a plague of flies a few years ago. Every year farmers fertilise their fields by “muckspreading” – spraying watered down cow manure over the land. It’s popular because it’s organic, not chemical, though the whole place stinks for a couple of weeks. Unfortunately, because of an accident of temperature and other conditions, one year the muck nurtured millions of flies which then invaded the village. Many people fled as refugees to neighbouring towns, and the local pub closed down when flies covered the kitchen. The vicar did mention the plague in his Sunday sermon, but wasn’t brave enough to give the responsibility to God.

Remember the plague when all the cattle died? Well just watch the news from drought stricken areas in Africa, Australia, and South America.

Oh yes, the plague of frogs. Well in Northern Australia they have real plague of giant imported frogs. Don’t read this if you are squeamish, but I saw a TV programme about drivers swerving all over the road trying to squash as many of the invading frogs as they can during their journeys.

And storms destroying all the crops? Well the Philippines is no stranger to this, and the past year has been one of the worst on record.

Is someone trying to tell us something?

Isn’t it an odd world that we live in?