Unpalatable plagues

We find Exodus chapters 7 to 10 quite hard to read. When we ask why this is, Motyer is surely spot on.

“If, then, we make our way past peripherals (what a nasty experience to find water become blood!) to the heart of the matter, we have a problem with the plague simply because we step back from the truth of the wrath of God against sin and the judgment of God upon sinners. We would prefer the bliss of a kingdom of God without moral absolutes, presided over by a God without wrath, and entered through a Christ without a cross. But the price for this would be to discard not just this or that bit of the Bible (e.g., Exodus 7-10) but the whole God-given book, for in it God has revealed his absolutes and that he is a God of intense, fiery holiness. Jesus died bearing our sins in his body on the cross, for that is what sin merits, and saving us from the wrath to come, for that is where sin leads. If the plagues begin with the disasters sin brings, they lead inexorably to the death with which sin ends.” (Page 116)