The plagues look like chaos, but they are a lecture with visual aids. Frogs, flies, hail, each one dismantles an Egyptian certainty until the point stands alone: the earth is the LORD's, and everything in it.

A rich young man in Matthew needs the same lecture gently: what he owns has quietly started owning him. Hold your possessions loosely as you read today.

Every plague repossessed something Egypt thought it owned, the river, the herds, the harvest, the weather, and returned the title to its Maker. Psalm 24 is the plague narrative sung: the earth is the LORD's and everything in it. Ownership was always on loan.

The rich young man's sorrow shows the personal edge of that truth. He could keep commandments but not open his hands, and he walked away sad to keep the loan. Do not read him from a distance; read him in a mirror. Then hear the hope Jesus attached: with God, even camels fit, even grips loosen, all things are possible.