Wednesday 11 September 2013

Exodus 2 Introducing Moses

Exodus Chapter 2

Exodus 2

We now get the introduction and birth of Moses, one of the big characters of the first 5 books of the Bible – Indeed he is traditionally credited with writing these books (known as the Torah or Law)

Moses is born to Israelite slaves who hide him for 3 months to protect his life from the edict to kill all baby boys. 
Eventually they despair and (sort of) obey the law by placing young Moses in a basket and releasing it onto the Nile river. 

Moses big sister, Miriam, follows the basket until he is fished out by an Egyptian princess who falls in love with the baby and decides to keep him. 

At this point Miriam pops up and offers to find a nurse for young Moses – his own mother, who now is paid to look after her son!
Moses lives with his parents until he is old enough to move into the palace with his adoptive mother.
For interest the name Moses is actually Egyptian and means “drawn forth” as she had drawn him out from the river.

Next thing Moses is grown up and spots an Egyptian beating one of his people, Moses then commits murder to protect his relative, but his attack is witnessed.
When Moses realises that his crime is known and his life is in danger, he runs away to Midian, helps a shepherd woman with her sheep and gets taken in by her family. Reminds me of Isaac and Rebecca a bit.
Moses marries the young woman Zipporah and has 2 sons, apparently settling down.

The end of the chapter reminds us that while Pharaoh's, Monarchs, prime ministers, presidents etc come and go, God is watching what is happening.
This is interesting to me, elsewhere in the Bible it says that God sometimes takes time to act. If things are going wrong, it does not necessarily mean that God is indifferent, or even that God approves, it might be that God is waiting for the best time to intervene.

Later in the book we find that Moses was 80 years old when he returns to Egypt, but we do not know how long before Moses was born the Israelites were enslaved, but we can tell that it is the greater part of a century before God knew it was time to act. 


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