The Dragon, the Reed, and the Rock Text: Ezekiel 29:1-16
Introduction: The Primal Sin
Every sin, if you follow it back to its source, has the same DNA. Every rebellion, every transgression, every act of folly is a faint and pathetic echo of the first lie whispered in the garden. That lie is this: "You will be like God." It is the sin of autonomy, the sin of self-creation, the sin of pretending you are the author of your own story. Man is a creature, and the fundamental temptation of man is to forget that he is a creature.
In our passage today, the prophet Ezekiel is directed by God to confront this sin in its most concentrated and arrogant form. He is to set his face against Pharaoh, the king of Egypt. Egypt was more than just a nation; it was a symbol. It was the world system in all its glory, power, and pride. It was the civilization built on the Nile, a civilization that believed it had tamed the gods and mastered its own destiny. And at the head of this civilization was Pharaoh, a man who was considered a god, an incarnation of Horus, the lord of the sky.
When God confronts Pharaoh, He is not just dealing with a geopolitical rival of Israel. He is confronting the foundational lie of all paganism and all secularism. He is confronting the great beast, the dragon, who says of his world, "This is mine. I made this." And God's response is to show him, and all who trust in him, that he is not a god, but a creature. He is not a dragon, but a fish on a hook. He is not a sturdy staff to lean on, but a flimsy reed that shatters and wounds. This is not just ancient history. The spirit of Pharaoh is alive and well. It lives in every government that claims ultimate authority, every academic who claims to be the measure of all things, and in every human heart that rises up and says, "My life is mine, and I have made it."
The Text
In the tenth year, in the tenth month, on the twelfth of the month, the word of Yahweh came to me saying, “Son of man, set your face against Pharaoh king of Egypt and prophesy against him and against all Egypt. Speak and say, ‘Thus says Lord Yahweh, “Behold, I am against you, Pharaoh king of Egypt, The great monster that lies in the midst of his canals of the Nile, That has said, ‘My Nile is mine, and I myself have made it.’ I will put hooks in your jaws And make the fish of your canals of the Nile cling to your scales. And I will bring you up out of the midst of your canals of the Nile, And all the fish of your canals of the Nile will cling to your scales. I will abandon you to the wilderness, you and all the fish of your canals of the Nile; You will fall on the open field; you will not be brought together or gathered. I have given you for food to the beasts of the earth and to the birds of the sky. Then all the inhabitants of Egypt will know that I am Yahweh Because they have been only a staff made of reed to the house of Israel. When they seized you with the hand, You tore and split open all their shoulders; And when they leaned on you, You broke and made all their loins quake.” ‘Therefore thus says Lord Yahweh, “Behold, I will bring upon you a sword, and I will cut off from you man and beast. The land of Egypt will become a desolation and waste. Then they will know that I am Yahweh. Because you said, ‘The Nile is mine, and I have made it,’ therefore, behold, I am against you and against your canals of the Nile, and I will make the land of Egypt an utter waste and desolation, from Migdol to Syene and even to the border of Ethiopia. A man’s foot will not pass through it, and the foot of a beast will not pass through it, and it will not be inhabited for forty years. So I will make the land of Egypt a desolation in the midst of desolated lands. And her cities, in the midst of cities that are laid waste, will be desolate forty years; and I will scatter the Egyptians among the nations and disperse them among the lands.” ‘For thus says Lord Yahweh, “At the end of forty years I will gather the Egyptians from the peoples among whom they were scattered. I will return the fortunes of Egypt and make them return to the land of Pathros, to the land of their origin, and there they will be a lowly kingdom. It will be the lowest of the kingdoms, and it will never again lift itself up above the nations. And I will make them so small that they will not have dominion over the nations. And it will never again be the security of the house of Israel, bringing to remembrance the iniquity of their having turned to go after Egypt. Then they will know that I am Lord Yahweh.” ’ ”
(Ezekiel 29:1-16 LSB)
The Boast of the Dragon (vv. 1-5)
The prophecy begins with a direct confrontation.
"Behold, I am against you, Pharaoh king of Egypt, The great monster that lies in the midst of his canals of the Nile, That has said, ‘My Nile is mine, and I myself have made it.’" (Ezekiel 29:3 LSB)
God identifies Pharaoh as a "great monster," or a great dragon. The word here is tannin. This is a direct polemic against Egyptian theology. The Pharaoh was often depicted as a crocodile, the powerful, fearsome lord of the Nile. He saw himself as the apex predator, the source of Egypt's life and prosperity. God looks at this self-proclaimed deity and says, "You are a monster." You are a creature of chaos, not order.
And then God quotes the monster's heart. "My Nile is mine, and I myself have made it." This is the blasphemy that seals his doom. It is the ultimate expression of the Creator/creature distinction being violated. Pharaoh is not giving thanks to a higher power for the annual inundation of the Nile that made his land fertile. He is taking the credit himself. He is claiming to be the uncaused cause, the self-existent one. This is the original sin of Satan, who was not content to be the highest of creatures but wanted to be the Creator. It is the sin of Nebuchadnezzar, who looked at his city and said, "Is not this great Babylon, that I have built?" (Dan. 4:30). And it is the central lie of modern secular humanism, which declares that man is the measure of all things, the captain of his own soul.
God's response to this boast is a picture of utter humiliation. He says, "I will put hooks in your jaws." The great, sovereign crocodile is about to be treated like a common fish. The one who thought he was the master of his domain is going to be yanked out of it by a power infinitely greater. Notice the imagery. God is the great fisherman, and all of history is His river. He can pull out whomever He pleases, whenever He pleases. The mightiest emperor is but a minnow on His line.
And what of Pharaoh's people, his armies, his wealth? They are the "fish of your canals" that "cling to your scales." They have attached themselves to this proud beast, and so they will share his fate. When a nation follows a proud and blasphemous leader, they will be dragged into the wilderness with him. They will be pulled from their place of comfort and security and cast onto the dry ground to be food for scavengers. The one who built great tombs to preserve his body for eternity will not even receive a burial. This is divine irony. God’s judgment is always poetic; it always fits the crime.
The Treachery of the Reed (vv. 6-9)
The focus now shifts from Egypt's sin against God to Egypt's sin against God's people.
"Then all the inhabitants of Egypt will know that I am Yahweh Because they have been only a staff made of reed to the house of Israel. When they seized you with the hand, You tore and split open all their shoulders; And when they leaned on you, You broke and made all their loins quake." (Ezekiel 29:6-7 LSB)
The purpose of this judgment is doxological: "that they will know that I am Yahweh." God acts in history so that His name will be known. But the specific reason given here is that Egypt has been a false hope for Israel. Throughout their history, whenever Israel was threatened by Assyria or Babylon, they were tempted to run south to Egypt for help. They were tempted to make a political alliance with the dragon instead of trusting in their covenant Lord.
God here says that leaning on Egypt is like leaning on a staff made of a river reed. It looks like it might offer support, but the moment you put your weight on it, it shatters. And not only does it fail to support you, it splinters and drives sharp pieces into your hand and shoulder. Trusting in the arm of the flesh is not just ineffective; it is painful. It will always wound you.
This is a permanent spiritual lesson. The world, with all its apparent power, its military might, its economic stability, its cultural prestige, is a reed staff. The church is always tempted to lean on it. We are tempted to make alliances with "Pharaoh" to get things done, to build our ministries, to protect our freedoms. But every time the church leans on the world's power, that reed will break and wound us. Our only true support is the rock of our salvation, the Lord Jesus Christ. Any other ground is sinking sand, and any other staff is a broken reed.
The Humbling of the Nation (vv. 10-16)
Because of Pharaoh's pride and Egypt's treachery, God pronounces a sentence of desolation.
"Because you said, ‘The Nile is mine, and I have made it,’ therefore, behold, I am against you... and I will make the land of Egypt an utter waste and desolation... for forty years." (Ezekiel 29:9-11 LSB)
God explicitly connects the punishment to the crime. "Because you said... therefore, I will." Our words matter. Our theology matters. When a nation's leadership embraces a blasphemous worldview, that nation sets itself on a collision course with reality, which is to say, with God Himself. The land that was their source of pride will become a wasteland. The source of their life will be the scene of their death.
The judgment will last for forty years. This number is not accidental. It is the number of testing, the number of trial. It is the length of time Israel wandered in the wilderness to purge a generation of unbelief. Egypt, in a sense, must now go through its own wilderness wandering. They must be humbled, scattered, and broken before they can be restored.
But here, at the end of this fierce prophecy, we find a surprising turn. We find grace.
"At the end of forty years I will gather the Egyptians... and there they will be a lowly kingdom... It will be the lowest of the kingdoms, and it will never again lift itself up above the nations." (Ezekiel 29:13-15 LSB)
God's judgment is not simply to destroy. His ultimate purpose is to humble and then to restore, but on His terms. Egypt will exist again, but it will be a "lowly kingdom." The pride will be surgically removed. God will save them, but He will save them from their own imperial ambitions. He will knock the crown off their head so that they can finally look up.
And what is the ultimate goal of all this? It is for the good of God's people. God says Egypt "will never again be the security of the house of Israel." God is removing the temptation. He is breaking the reed staff for good so that His people will finally learn to stop leaning on it. God will rearrange the entire geopolitical landscape of the Middle East for the sanctification of His church. He is that committed to our holiness. He will bring down empires to cure us of our wandering eyes.
Conclusion: The Self-Emptied King
The sin of Pharaoh is the sin of self-deification. "My Nile is mine, and I have made it." It is the anthem of the proud human heart. It is the spirit of our age. We live in a world of self-made men who worship their creator, which is to say, themselves.
But the gospel presents us with a king who is the absolute antithesis of Pharaoh. We worship a King who, though He was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped. We worship a King who could truly say of the entire universe, "It is mine, and I have made it," yet He "emptied Himself, by taking the form of a servant" (Philippians 2:7).
Pharaoh, a mere creature, tried to ascend to the throne of the Creator. Christ, the true Creator, descended to the place of the creature. Pharaoh sat in his palace and boasted. Christ hung on a cross and bled. Pharaoh was a great monster who devoured. Christ is the Lamb of God who was slain. Pharaoh was the broken reed that wounds all who lean on him. Christ is the Rock of Ages, and all who build their lives on Him will never be shaken.
The judgment on Pharaoh is a warning to all who would build their lives, their families, or their nations on the proud lie of autonomy. That way leads to desolation. But the grace shown to Egypt is a promise. God's desire is not to destroy the proud, but to humble them so that they might be saved. He brings us low so that we might look up. He breaks the reeds we lean on so that we might finally learn to lean all our weight on Him. And when we do, we find that He is not a reed at all, but a cornerstone, a fortress, and a king who will never fail.