916 Biblical Characters - The Birth of Moses
Exploring Biblical Characters • Sermon • Submitted
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- If anything has been highlighted during this pandemic, it is fear
- Fear, whether it has been ramped up unnecessarily or not, fear causes people to act in certain ways that they would never have considered doing before
- There are healthy fears & there are unbalanced fears
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- Fear can cause people to act in incredibly cruel ways
- We have seen, we have witnessed the callous disregard for individuals through this pandemic
Q. Would Jesus have acted in these ways? No way in the world
- Pregnant women arrested & man-handled
- People forbidden to see dying relatives – forbidden to attend funerals
- Inordinate & unhinged fear has caused untold cruelty
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- Just look at Pharaoh’s fear in this text today (shrewdly, cunningly)
- The Israelite population in Egypt has been growing in great numbers
10 “Come, let us deal wisely with them, or else they will multiply and in the event of war, they will also join themselves to those who hate us, and fight against us and depart from the land.” 11 So they appointed taskmasters over them to afflict them with hard labor. And they built for Pharaoh storage cities, Pithom and Raamses.
- So we must suppress them & deal harshly with them because they are multiplying to the point where we will no longer be able to control them
- Fear of the Hebrews has led Pharaoh to inflict terribly cruelty upon them
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- He ordered the Hebrew midwives to kill the newborn males. Why only boys?
- Because only males were a threat – women were not warriors & have never really been warriors despite what the movies show you
-Generally speaking, shear physical strength is something that God has built into the man
- Get rid of the boys & in the future, they could not mount an army to oppose you
- They are happy to murder children to placate their fears
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- It astonishes me that, ordinarily, the most compassionate of people (& people who also consider themselves as compassionate) have changed their persona& lost touch with their true self because of fear – the danger for Christians in this, is in losing touch with the heart of Jesus
- We must not allow fear to control us & change us into someone we would never ordinarily be
- I think, once the pandemic is behind us (once its over), in years to come, there will be some sober reflection done on the responses that have revealed a selfish & ugly side of humanity
1. The Fear of God Motive
1. The Fear of God Motive
- But not all fear is negative
- Some fears are healthy & stimulate good outcomes
I remember a tongue-in-cheek comment by a lady in a Pizza Hut Restaurant. Ros & I were near by at an adjacent table with our kids
I’m sure Ros remembers it since it was a very funny response. I just remember that her kids were making a noise & she said something to the tune of “can you kids go out & play on the highway”? All ears pricked up & once the pun dropped there were plenty of chuckles
- As parents, through fear of what might happen to our children, we keep them away from the highways
- We think ahead of possible dangers & eliminate those dangers so our kids are kept safe
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- Then, there is the fear of God
Q. How shall we understand that?
- There are commentators & even some translations that like to soften the concept of the fear of God to that of reverence or respect
- That might be handy in trying to help people not to think of God as some vicious monster that frightens you into submission
- But then again, it can be misleading to not have that sense of fear as in being afraid or frightened because that is clearly present
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- We see in this passage that the Hebrew midwives feared God &, as a result, refused to kill the male babies
- Yes, they had a reverence for God but the word has clear meaning & is translated as “feared God”
- Here is the same word used elsewhere nearby...
14 But he said, “Who made you a prince or a judge over us? Are you intending to kill me as you killed the Egyptian?” Then Moses was afraid and said, “Surely the matter has become known.”
6 He said also, “I am the God of your father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob.” Then Moses hid his face, for he was afraid to look at God.
- You cannot dismiss the notion of being afraid – of being scared!
- It was through the fear of God that these women put their own lives on the line in defying Pharaoh’s edict
- God came before Pharaoh – they feared God more than they feared Pharaoh
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- Let the penny drop here for a moment
- Pharaoh could have done much harm to these midwives, but they understand that a greater harm could befall them if they violated the will of their God
- Now there are no specific commands, at this point, that we could read as far as the murder of infants are concerned
- However, there was clear understanding about the line of Abraham & the sacredness of the promise of God & of the people of God
- To kill the males violated the promise & plan of God for the line of Abraham
- That’s one side of the coin
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- The other side, of course, is the inherent understanding of God as life-giver
- To take life – as in murder – would be contrary to God’s ways
- That, at least, must be clear, for why would it say that they feared God & refused to kill the male babies?
- This is the first recorded case in the Bible of civil disobedience in defence of a moral position
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- Look at why such a thing as the fear of God exists
- As Abraham journeyed in the new land, he told people that Sarah was his sister & Abimelech, King of Gerar had Sarah lined up for marriage until God came to him in a dream
3 But God came to Abimelech in a dream of the night, and said to him, “Behold, you are a dead man because of the woman whom you have taken, for she is married.” 4 Now Abimelech had not come near her; and he said, “Lord, will You slay a nation, even though blameless? 5 “Did he not himself say to me, ‘She is my sister’? And she herself said, ‘He is my brother.’ In the integrity of my heart and the innocence of my hands I have done this.” 6 Then God said to him in the dream, “Yes, I know that in the integrity of your heart you have done this, and I also kept you from sinning against Me; therefore I did not let you touch her.
7 “Now therefore, restore the man’s wife, for he is a prophet, and he will pray for you and you will live. But if you do not restore her, know that you shall surely die, you and all who are yours.” 8 So Abimelech arose early in the morning and called all his servants and told all these things in their hearing; and the men were greatly frightened. 9 Then Abimelech called Abraham and said to him, “What have you done to us? And how have I sinned against you, that you have brought on me and on my kingdom a great sin? You have done to me things that ought not to be done.” 10 And Abimelech said to Abraham, “What have you encountered, that you have done this thing?” 11 Abraham said, “Because I thought, surely there is no fear of God in this place, and they will kill me because of my wife.
- Well, in actual fact, there seemed to have been a fear of God in that place after all
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Q. Is it possible for people to lose the fear of God?
- To defy the authorities we are so used to & know would be a hard thing to do
- We can certainly suffer under the authorities in the western world, but imagine what it was like for these midwives
- Pharaoh had the power of life or death over them
- But they must have known that that would only happen by the will of their God
11 Jesus answered, “You would have no authority over Me, unless it had been given you from above; for this reason he who delivered Me to you has the greater sin.”
- Jesus knew that ultimate authority is in the hands of the Lord Almighty
- That’s why the midwives feared God – He alone has their life in His hands
2. Trusting in God’s Providence
2. Trusting in God’s Providence
- One of the theological struggles or wrestles I had to undergo was this question of God’s control & my actions
Q. If God is in control, then, does it matter what I do?
Q. Or if I do things how I want, how is it that God is in control?
- This is the age old “mystery” that many people have wrestled with
- I’m at peace with how I understand it but it is hard to understand
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- God is sovereign but in His sovereignty, he works through men & women
- Paul brings the two concepts together beautifully in...
12 So then, my beloved, just as you have always obeyed, not as in my presence only, but now much more in my absence, work out your salvation with fear and trembling; 13 for it is God who is at work in you, both to will and to work for His good pleasure.
- Your part – work out your salvation with fear & trembling
- I’d challenge anyone to try & make the word fear there into merely reverence
- Certainly, reverence is not missing here, but it cannot fully account for the notion of fear as with trembling
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- The second aspect is God’s work
- What we do in working out our salvation with fear & trembling becomes none other than the work & will of God in your life
- He is the motivator, the driver, the power
- The two concepts here cannot be separated
- Lydia heard the message of Christ as Paul preached it
- Lydia responded to Christ in faith
- But it says that the Lord opened Lydia’s heart to believe
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- When Paul was opposed by the Jews in the Synagogues of Asia Minor, in disgust, he said that he take the message to the Gentiles
- Look how Luke records what happened after that
48 When the Gentiles heard this, they began rejoicing and glorifying the word of the Lord; and as many as had been appointed to eternal life believed.
- First God appointed & then they believed
- We think that we chose God, but on the truest level, God chose us
- This is a key passage that helped me understand that the sovereignty of God is not divorced from the actions of mankind but the controlling or sovereign factor behind it
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- The midwives, for their faithfulness & courage are sovereignly granted households of their own
- Interestingly, these midwives were not perfect – they lied to Pharaoh when he asked about their failure in killing the male children
- They said the Hebrew women are vigorous & have their children before they can get to them
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- People aren’t perfect & these midwives kept the main thing the main thing
- What they did in refusing to obey Pharaoh gained the approval of God
- Just as God declared David to be a man after His own heart yet there was the incident of Bathsheba & Uriah
- Solomon was called Jedidiah, meaning “beloved of the Lord”, yet their were great failures in his life
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- Since the plan to have the midwives kill the male children failed, Pharaoh turned to his own people to do the killing
Q. Can you imagine having your neighbours dob on you, or worse, come after your newborn son?
22 Then Pharaoh commanded all his people, saying, “Every son who is born you are to cast into the Nile, and every daughter you are to keep alive.”
- It was during this trying time that God rose up a saviour for Israel
- His name would be Moses & this is the account of his birth
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- It was touch & go – most would say that Moses only just “made it out by the skin of his yet to come through teeth”
- When you think about slim margin of survival & the like, you should consider the likes of lotteries
- Let’s say a person buys a ticket in the lottery & they miss the prize money by 1 digit
- Everyone would say, “Oh, you got so close” – but did he really?
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- Actually, no, he was no where near it
- He could have been out by a country mile & he was in was in a no better place than the 1 digit out – he lost & the losses would have been the same
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- Same with the narrow escape of Moses’ life
- By God’s sovereignty, he survived & went on to be God’s instrument in the deliverance or salvation of the Israelites
- It doesn’t matter how close it was – God had it under His control
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- In Ex. 6:20 it says that Moses’ parents were named Amram & Jochebed
- They also defied Pharaoh’s order & hid their son for 3 mths until they could hide him no longer
- Rather than have him thrown alive into the Nile by a charming neighbour, Jochebed decided to release him into the sovereign hand of God
- They placed him in a wicker basket covered with what we would know as tar – the gooey black stuff of bitumen – so that it would not leak & sink & placed him among the reeds of the Nile
- Iain Campbell makes a pertinent point when he says...
“...it was easy to have faith when Moses could be seen and protected at home, but it was something else to commit him to God’s care and the waters of the Nile”!1
- This term for basket here is only ever used elsewhere for Noah’s Ark
- You could say that as Noah’s Ark was protected by the hand of God, the baby Moses in the “Wicker Ark” will equally be protected by the sovereign hand of God
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- Now it is not said that this was Jochebed’s strategy, but the wicker basket is placed in the vicinity of where the women of the royal household would go to bathe
- Thermuthis, Pharaoh's Daughter, came down to bathe & she sees the “Ark/wicker basket” among the reeds of the Nile
- She hears the boy crying & sends her maid to get him
- She identifies the boy as one of the Hebrew’s children, yet she does not throw him into the Nile, but has pity/compassion on him
- The sovereign action of God is not limited in any way & he works His purpose through the very princess of Egypt
- May I remind us of what happened with Joseph – from what seemed a hopeless situation, he virtually became prince of Egypt, second only to Pharaoh
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- But if this sparing of Moses seems enough in these circumstances, Miriam, the boy’s sister, just happens to be nearby & with idol curiosity says, “Oh, would you like me to find a breast feeding Hebrew woman”?
- The princess thinks that is a good idea – so she sends her off to get a breast-feeding woman who is able to nurse the boy & she goes & gets her mother (who is probably ready to have her son feed at this stage)
- Not only does Jochebed get her son back, but the princess says that she will pay her for the privilege!!!
- Wow, I bet she never saw that one coming!
- She would have gone straight home, fed the boy & gave much thanks to God
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- When Moses was weaned, he became the princess’ son
- That would have, no doubt, been hard for Amram & Jochebed but, at least, their son remained alive & well cared for
- With his new position as a child of the princess, he received a new name
- She names him Moses, the meaning given here as, “because I drew him out of the water”
- Not only did God keep this new deliverer safe from Pharaoh’s murderous edict, ironically, Moses is now brought up as Pharaoh’s own grandson & part of the royal family
3. The Power of a Promise
3. The Power of a Promise
- As Moses grows up, he starts to identify with his Hebrew origin & is very unhappy over the harsh treatment being dealt out to his ethnic brothers
- Before crossing a road, we teach our children to look to the right & then to the left – from one side to the other before they cross the road
- We want them to avoid being hit by a car
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- Moses must have got enraged at the treatment dished out by an Egyptian & he decides to get rid of him so he kills him
- We might not condone what Moses did, but he certainly has displayed a propensity to free his fellow Israelites
- But first, he looks one way & then the other way, not to see if any cars are coming but if any witnesses are watching
- He didn’t get away with it, however – it had become known
- In fear of Pharaoh, who is out to kill him, he flees to the country of Midian & he is there for 40 yrs in which time, that Pharaoh had died
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- Which leads us to the significant statement at the end of these passages
23 Now it came about in the course of those many days that the king of Egypt died. And the sons of Israel sighed because of the bondage, and they cried out; and their cry for help because of their bondage rose up to God. 24 So God heard their groaning; and God remembered His covenant with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. 25 God saw the sons of Israel, and God took notice of them.
- This last statement is confirmation of the power of God’s promise
- God took notice of the children of Abraham
- God remembered His covenant with Abraham, Isaac & Jacob
- Even though so much time had passed, God never forgets
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- This is the point of the Moses story – God remembers His promise & covenant
- The power of His promise caused Him to raise up Moses as the significant figure who would be instrumental in freeing the Israelites from their slavery
- It would be through Moses, that God will make them into a great nation & bring them back into the land He had promised them
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- We are dealing with the history of God’s salvation
- This is only the early stages of what God was ultimately planning through His promise to Abraham
- That promise as the NT clearly outlines comes to fulfilment in Jesus Christ through whom the whole world - those who would turn to Him from every nation – is blessed through Him
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- Our thought for today goes back to my introduction on fear
- Fear, if it is human centred, can be selfish, callous & cruel
- However, fear that is theocentric (God-centred) is a fear that can only bring your life into a healthy relationship with God
- With this fear, we trust in God’s providential care & we trust that God will keep His promises
Question for today’s breakout room...
Q. What is your greatest fear and how can we sustain the fear of God? As a lead, perhaps someone could read
Rom. 12:1-2 “1 Therefore I urge you, brethren, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies a living and holy sacrifice, acceptable to God, which is your spiritual service of worship. 2 And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, so that you may prove what the will of God is, that which is good and acceptable and perfect.”
1 Iain D. Campbell, Opening up Exodus, Opening Up Commentary, (Leominster: Day One Publications, 2006), 27.