ur story now centers around the land of Egypt and in particularly on the life of Moses. Moses is considered to be perhaps the greatest of Israel’s leaders, a man who knew God intimately, and a man whom Jesus spoke about. Not until the ministry of Jesus would the world witness again such incredible demonstrations of the power of God as were performed through Moses. He was a man who spoke openly with the Lord and, it seems, a man who heard God speak as in normal conversation. He was responsible for writing down most if not all of the first five books of the Bible, and it is through him that we come to know God’s revelation in the law and commandments.
At the time of his birth, it is about 320 years since the seventy people of the tiny nation of Israel went into Egypt. Many things had changed. The Jews, as we also call them, now numbered in the hundreds of thousands. There were about five hundred thousand men besides women and children, and this caused the Pharaoh some concerns. Pharaoh was concerned that the Jews may join one of Egypt’s many enemies and try to overthrow the nation. Egypt was constantly being attacked by a group that is referred to in their ancient writings as the ‘sea people’. They would attack from the Mediterranean and also come into the Nile in boats.
The Pharaoh decided to put the Jews under forced labor as slaves and in this way to try and control them. They were thus treated as subhuman, as Pharaoh’s possessions, human animals put to work. What was even worse is that the Pharaoh set out on a course of mass genocide in an attempt to slow their increase in population. He ordered the Jewish midwives to kill every male child born as soon as it entered the world. However, the Jewish midwives feared God and refused to kill children, so they told the Pharaoh’s servants that they were never able to reach the mothers until the children had already been born.
Owing to the actions of the midwives, the Jewish people increased in number. Their lives however were very difficult. They were forced to make bricks all day and to build great cities for the Pharaoh. They were allowed little or no rest and they became bitter towards the Egyptians. Then the Pharaoh decided to issue a new command to the people. They were ordered to throw every newborn male child into the Nile River, but to allow the girls to live. It was at this point that God intervened. We are not told of how many children were murdered in the Nile, but from out of this river which the Egyptians considered sacred, God also brought the leader who would be used to deliver the people from their sufferings and slavery.
Moses’ parents were Levites, the tribe which would later be set apart to be the priests of God. When Moses was born his mother hid him, but he soon became too big to hide so she placed her threemonth-old son into a wicker basket which she covered in tar. It was like a miniature ark, and like the huge ark before it, it would be an instrument of salvation. Moses’ mother knew that Pharaoh’s daughter often went down to the river to bathe, so she placed the child and ark in the reeds beside the river’s edge and told her daughter to watch and see what would happen. Pharaoh’s daughter came to the river, saw the basket, and found a crying young Moses inside. She took pity on the child and decided to keep him. She needed a wet nurse and Moses’ sister asked her if she would like her to get one of the Hebrew women to come and help to feed the child. Pharaoh’s daughter agreed, so the girl ran and fetched her mother. So Moses’ mother was paid to raise her own son, and when he was older Pharaoh’s daughter adopted him as her own son and he lived in the palace. Moses therefore received the benefits of Egyptian educa- tion, and he was also taught about the God of Israel.
The main events of Moses’ life are roughly divided into three equal parts of forty years. At the age of forty he was a well educated man, a prince of Egypt with social and political power. However, he was also aware of his heritage as a Jew. One day he saw an Egyptian brutally beating a Jewish slave and he intervened. The fight ended with the Egyptian dying so Moses buried the man in the sand. The next day he saw two Jewish men fighting and he asked them why they were beating each other up. One of them asked him if he had been made a ruler over them, and if he was going to kill him as he had done the Egyptian the day before. When Pharaoh heard about this he was furious and decided to kill Moses, so Moses decided it was time to leave town.
He fled to a place called Midian. One day Moses was near a well when the seven daughters of a priestof Midian came to water their flock. These shep - herds started harassing the girls and drove them off, so Moses decided to intervene. It would seem that
Moses enjoyed fighting, as he managed to get rid of these shepherds and help the girls to water their sheep. No doubt he had been trained as a soldier while living in Pharaoh’s palace, and it appears that he was a well build and very able man.
The young ladies reported to their father how this Egyptian had rescued them and he told them to invite Moses to dinner. His name was Jethro and he decided to give Moses one of his daughters in marriage. They had a son and Moses took up life as a shepherd for the next forty years and over that time he came to know the entire area of the Sinai Peninsula very well. Over this period of time the Pharaoh who had wanted Moses dead died himself, but his predecessor was even more cruel. This despot was convinced that he was a god and he recognised no other gods to be greater than himself. He was extremely arrogant and he worked the Jews brutally hard. The Jews cried out to God for deliverance and God heard their prayers. The Lord had prepared Moses for just this time and now it was time for them to make introductions.
One day Moses was grazing sheep on the mountain of Horeb which was also called the ‘mountain of God’ or Mount Sinai. He saw an unusual sight. There was a bush that had caught alight, however, the flames were not consuming the leaves. It wasn’t uncommon for a bush to burst into flame on a really hot day, yet Moses had never seen a bush burn which was not destroyed. He went over for a closer look. As he approached a voice spoke from within the bush and said his name. He said “here I am”, and the voice told him to stay where he was and remove his sandals as he was now standing on holy ground. Then the voice explained that he was the God of Abraham and Isaac, the God of the Jews. Moses was afraid and hid his face, too scared to look at the bush. Then God told him how he was about to bring the Israelites out of Egypt and take them to the land he had promised Abraham and Isaac. And the Lord explained to Moses that he would be the one to tell Pharaoh the news. Moses told the Lord that he was not the man for the job and the Lord contradicted him.1
Moses asked, “and if the people ask who sent me to Egypt what shall I tell them?”
God said to Moses, “I AM WHO I AM has sent you. Just tell them ‘I AM’ has sent you and that the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob has sent you. Go to the elders and tell them that I have decided to bring you out of your misery. However,” continued the Lord, “Pharaoh will not let you go unless a mighty hand compels him, therefore I will strike the Egyptians with wonders and powers which I will perform, and after that the King of Egypt will let you go. And what’s more,” said the Lord, “the Egyptians will give you gold and silver and riches, and you will plunder them.”
The name that God used for Himself, “I AM” is another way of saying “I have always been, or I am Infinity, the source of Infinity”.
Moses was still unconvinced that he was the right man to be heading off to Egypt on such a task, indeed this all sounded a bit too easy. So he said, “what if they will not listen to me and say I am not sent by God.” Then the Lord told him to throw his staff on the ground and it immediately turned into a large snake. Moses got a real fright and started to take off in the other direction, however the Lord told him to grab it by the tail and when he obeyed it became a staff again. Moses was then told to place his hand inside his cloak and pull it out again. It was covered in Leprosy, a disease which was seen as sores and rotting skin, and was feared as there was no cure in those days. The Lord told him to repeat this procedure and the hand became normal.
“Do these things, and the people will believe you,” the Lord told him, “and if not, take some water from the Nile, throw it on the ground and it will turn to blood.”
Moses was more convinced than before, but he decided that it was best that he point out another problem. I st, st, st, stutter he said. Now the Lord was losing patience with Moses. He told him to get going and that he would speak through him. But Moses insisted and this time the Lord got angry. However, the Lord recognised Moses’ fear and lack of faith and told him he could meet his brother Aaron and take him with him. Moses would speak to Aaron and Aaron would speak to the people because Aaron was a good public speaker. And so Moses left the mountain and went to find his brother.