Exodus 1-4: Questioning God (LSFAB S13E093)

[TEASER - 0:00  
Please send somebody else.

[INTRO S13E093 - 0:10]  
Coming to you from Riverside, California, this is the Lifespring Family Audio Bible and podcasting since 2004, I'm your OG Godcaster, Steve Webb. This is a daily podcast where we *will* read through the entire Bible in a year. This isn't a New Year's resolution. We're in the 13th season of the show, so as long as the Lord is willing, we will complete the season with having completed the entire Bible. So if you're new to the show, because of a New Year's resolution, you're in the right place. I will say that we are, with this episode, ninety-three episodes into our reading year. So what many people who come late do is they stay current with each day's episode. And after listening to that current episode, they then go back to the beginning of the season and listen to a second or even a third episode in one day to get caught up. A lot of people do that, so there is a thought for you.

Now, today is The Law Monday, and we're going to begin the book of Exodus with chapters 1 through 4. I'm calling today's episode, "Questioning God."

But before we read, let's pray.

[OPENING PRAYER - 1:14]
Our heavenly Father, we thank you for a new year, and as we gather around your Word today, we ask that you bless our time together. I pray this in Jesus' name. Amen.

Okay, let's begin.

[EXODUS 1 (NET) - 1:28]
Exodus, chapter 1.

(1) These are the names of the sons of Israel who entered Egypt – each man with his household entered with Jacob: (2) Reuben, Simeon, Levi, and Judah, (3) Issachar, Zebulun, and Benjamin, (4) Dan and Naphtali, Gad and Asher. (5) All the people who were directly descended from Jacob numbered seventy. But Joseph was already in Egypt, (6) and in time Joseph and his brothers and all that generation died. (7) The Israelites, however, were fruitful, increased greatly, multiplied, and became extremely strong, so that the land was filled with them.

(8) Then a new king, who did not know about Joseph, came to power over Egypt. (9) He said to his people, “Look at the Israelite people, more numerous and stronger than we are! (10) Come, let’s deal wisely with them. Otherwise they will continue to multiply, and if a war breaks out, they will ally themselves with our enemies and fight against us and leave the country.”

(11) So they put foremen over the Israelites to oppress them with hard labor. As a result they built Pithom and Rameses as store cities for Pharaoh. (12) But the more the Egyptians oppressed them, the more they multiplied and spread. As a result the Egyptians loathed the Israelites, (13) and they made the Israelites serve rigorously. (14) They made their lives bitter by hard service with mortar and bricks and by all kinds of service in the fields. Every kind of service the Israelites were required to give was rigorous.

(15) The king of Egypt said to the Hebrew midwives, one of whom was named Shiphrah and the other Puah, (16) “When you assist the Hebrew women in childbirth, observe at the delivery: If it is a son, kill him, but if it is a daughter, she may live.” (17) But the midwives feared God and did not do what the king of Egypt had told them; they let the boys live.

(18) Then the king of Egypt summoned the midwives and said to them, “Why have you done this and let the boys live?” (19) The midwives said to Pharaoh, “Because the Hebrew women are not like the Egyptian women – for the Hebrew women are vigorous; they give birth before the midwife gets to them!” (20) So God treated the midwives well, and the people multiplied and became very strong. (21) And because the midwives feared God, he made households for them.

(22) Then Pharaoh commanded all his people, “All sons that are born you must throw into the river, but all daughters you may let live.”

[EXODUS 2 (NET) - 3:54]
Exodus, chapter 2.

(1) A man from the household of Levi married a woman who was a descendant of Levi. (2) The woman became pregnant and gave birth to a son. When she saw that he was a healthy child, she hid him for three months. (3) But when she was no longer able to hide him, she took a papyrus basket for him and sealed it with bitumen and pitch. She put the child in it and set it among the reeds along the edge of the Nile. (4) His sister stationed herself at a distance to find out what would happen to him.

(5) Then the daughter of Pharaoh came down to wash herself by the Nile, while her attendants were walking alongside the river, and she saw the basket among the reeds. She sent one of her attendants, took it, (6) opened it, and saw the child – a boy, crying! – and she felt compassion for him and said, “This is one of the Hebrews’ children.”

(7) Then his sister said to Pharaoh’s daughter, “Shall I go and get a nursing woman for you from the Hebrews, so that she may nurse the child for you?” (8) Pharaoh’s daughter said to her, “Yes, do so.” So the young child went and got the child’s mother. (9) Pharaoh’s daughter said to her, “Take this child and nurse him for me, and I will pay your wages.” So the woman took the child and nursed him.

(10) When the child grew older she brought him to Pharaoh’s daughter, and he became her son. She named him Moses, saying, “Because I drew him from the water.”

(11) In those days, when Moses had grown up, he went out to his people and observed their hard labor, and he saw an Egyptian man attacking a Hebrew man, one of his own people. (12) He looked this way and that and saw that no one was there, and then he attacked the Egyptian and concealed the body in the sand. (13) When he went out the next day, there were two Hebrew men fighting. So he said to the one who was in the wrong, “Why are you attacking your fellow Hebrew?”

(14) The man replied, “Who made you a ruler and a judge over us? Are you planning to kill me like you killed that Egyptian?” Then Moses was afraid, thinking, “Surely what I did has become known.” (15) When Pharaoh heard about this event, he sought to kill Moses. So Moses fled from Pharaoh and settled in the land of Midian, and he settled by a certain well.

(16) Now a priest of Midian had seven daughters, and they came and began to draw water and fill the troughs in order to water their father’s flock. (17) When some shepherds came and drove them away, Moses came up and defended them and then watered their flock. (18) So when they came home to their father Reuel, he asked, “Why have you come home so early today?” (19) They said, “An Egyptian man rescued us from the shepherds, and he actually drew water for us and watered the flock!” (20) He said to his daughters, “So where is he? Why in the world did you leave the man? Call him, so that he may eat a meal with us.”

(21) Moses agreed to stay with the man, and he gave his daughter Zipporah to Moses in marriage. (22) When she bore a son, Moses named him Gershom, for he said, “I have become a resident foreigner in a foreign land.”

(23) During that long period of time the king of Egypt died, and the Israelites groaned because of the slave labor. They cried out, and their desperate cry because of their slave labor went up to God. (24) God heard their groaning, God remembered his covenant with Abraham, with Isaac, and with Jacob, (25) God saw the Israelites, and God understood….

[EXODUS 3 (NIV) - 7:07]
Exodus, chapter 3.

(1) Now Moses was tending the flock of Jethro his father-in-law, the priest of Midian, and he led the flock to the far side of the wilderness and came to Horeb, the mountain of God. (2) There the angel of the Lord appeared to him in flames of fire from within a bush. Moses saw that though the bush was on fire it did not burn up. (3) So Moses thought, “I will go over and see this strange sight—why the bush does not burn up.”

(4) When the Lord saw that he had gone over to look, God called to him from within the bush, “Moses! Moses!”

And Moses said, “Here I am.”

(5) “Do not come any closer,” God said. “Take off your sandals, for the place where you are standing is holy ground.” (6) Then he said, “I am the God of your father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob.” At this, Moses hid his face, because he was afraid to look at God.

(7) The Lord said, “I have indeed seen the misery of my people in Egypt. I have heard them crying out because of their slave drivers, and I am concerned about their suffering. (8) So I have come down to rescue them from the hand of the Egyptians and to bring them up out of that land into a good and spacious land, a land flowing with milk and honey—the home of the Canaanites, Hittites, Amorites, Perizzites, Hivites and Jebusites. (9) And now the cry of the Israelites has reached me, and I have seen the way the Egyptians are oppressing them. (10) So now, go. I am sending you to Pharaoh to bring my people the Israelites out of Egypt.”

(11) But Moses said to God, “Who am I that I should go to Pharaoh and bring the Israelites out of Egypt?”

(12) And God said, “I will be with you. And this will be the sign to you that it is I who have sent you: When you have brought the people out of Egypt, you will worship God on this mountain.”

(13) Moses said to God, “Suppose I go to the Israelites and say to them, ‘The God of your fathers has sent me to you,’ and they ask me, ‘What is his name?’ Then what shall I tell them?”

(14) God said to Moses, “I am who I am. This is what you are to say to the Israelites: ‘I am has sent me to you.’ ”

(15) God also said to Moses, “‘The Lord, the God of your fathers—the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob—has sent me to you.’

“This is my name forever,
the name you shall call me
from generation to generation.

(16) “Go, assemble the elders of Israel and say to them, ‘The Lord, the God of your fathers—the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob—appeared to me and said: I have watched over you and have seen what has been done to you in Egypt. (17) And I have promised to bring you up out of your misery in Egypt into the land of the Canaanites, Hittites, Amorites, Perizzites, Hivites and Jebusites—a land flowing with milk and honey.’

(18) “The elders of Israel will listen to you. Then you and the elders are to go to the king of Egypt and say to him, ‘The Lord, the God of the Hebrews, has met with us. Let us take a three-day journey into the wilderness to offer sacrifices to the Lord our God.’ (19) But I know that the king of Egypt will not let you go unless a mighty hand compels him. (20) So I will stretch out my hand and strike the Egyptians with all the wonders that I will perform among them. After that, he will let you go.

(21) “And I will make the Egyptians favorably disposed toward this people, so that when you leave you will not go empty-handed. (22) Every woman is to ask her neighbor and any woman living in her house for articles of silver and gold and for clothing, which you will put on your sons and daughters. And so you will plunder the Egyptians.” 

[EXODUS 4 (NIV) - 10:32]
Exodus, chapter 4.

(1) Moses answered, “What if they do not believe me or listen to me and say, ‘The Lord did not appear to you’?”

(2) Then the Lord said to him, “What is that in your hand?”

“A staff,” he replied.

(3) The Lord said, “Throw it on the ground.”

Moses threw it on the ground and it became a snake, and he ran from it. (4) Then the Lord said to him, “Reach out your hand and take it by the tail.” So Moses reached out and took hold of the snake and it turned back into a staff in his hand. (5) “This,” said the Lord, “is so that they may believe that the Lord, the God of their fathers—the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob—has appeared to you.”

(6) Then the Lord said, “Put your hand inside your cloak.” So Moses put his hand into his cloak, and when he took it out, the skin was leprous—it had become as white as snow.

(7) “Now put it back into your cloak,” he said. So Moses put his hand back into his cloak, and when he took it out, it was restored, like the rest of his flesh.

(8) Then the Lord said, “If they do not believe you or pay attention to the first sign, they may believe the second. (9) But if they do not believe these two signs or listen to you, take some water from the Nile and pour it on the dry ground. The water you take from the river will become blood on the ground.”

(10) Moses said to the Lord, “Pardon your servant, Lord. I have never been eloquent, neither in the past nor since you have spoken to your servant. I am slow of speech and tongue.”

(11) The Lord said to him, “Who gave human beings their mouths? Who makes them deaf or mute? Who gives them sight or makes them blind? Is it not I, the Lord? (12) Now go; I will help you speak and will teach you what to say.”

(13) But Moses said, “Pardon your servant, Lord. Please send someone else.”

(14) Then the Lord’s anger burned against Moses and he said, “What about your brother, Aaron the Levite? I know he can speak well. He is already on his way to meet you, and he will be glad to see you. (15) You shall speak to him and put words in his mouth; I will help both of you speak and will teach you what to do. (16) He will speak to the people for you, and it will be as if he were your mouth and as if you were God to him. (17) But take this staff in your hand so you can perform the signs with it.”

(18) Then Moses went back to Jethro his father-in-law and said to him, “Let me return to my own people in Egypt to see if any of them are still alive.”

Jethro said, “Go, and I wish you well.”

(19) Now the Lord had said to Moses in Midian, “Go back to Egypt, for all those who wanted to kill you are dead.” (20) So Moses took his wife and sons, put them on a donkey and started back to Egypt. And he took the staff of God in his hand.

(21) The Lord said to Moses, “When you return to Egypt, see that you perform before Pharaoh all the wonders I have given you the power to do. But I will harden his heart so that he will not let the people go. (22) Then say to Pharaoh, ‘This is what the Lord says: Israel is my firstborn son, (23) and I told you, “Let my son go, so he may worship me.” But you refused to let him go; so I will kill your firstborn son.’”

(24) At a lodging place on the way, the Lord met Moses and was about to kill him. (25) But Zipporah took a flint knife, cut off her son’s foreskin and touched Moses’ feet with it. “Surely you are a bridegroom of blood to me,” she said. (26) So the Lord let him alone. (At that time she said “bridegroom of blood,” referring to circumcision.)

(27) The Lord said to Aaron, “Go into the wilderness to meet Moses.” So he met Moses at the mountain of God and kissed him. (28) Then Moses told Aaron everything the Lord had sent him to say, and also about all the signs he had commanded him to perform.

(29) Moses and Aaron brought together all the elders of the Israelites, (30) and Aaron told them everything the Lord had said to Moses. He also performed the signs before the people, (31) and they believed. And when they heard that the Lord was concerned about them and had seen their misery, they bowed down and worshiped.

[COMMENTARY - 14:36]
All right, in chapter 4, verse 24, we read, "At a lodging place on the way, the Lord met Moses and was about to kill him.”

Did that grab your attention when you heard it? Why was God going to kill Moses?

Well, we're not specifically told why but it's always good - as you've heard me say more than once - it's always good to look at the context. So let's do that now.

First notice that in chapter 3 when God told Moses that he was going to send him to tell Pharaoh to let the Israelites go, Moses questioned God. "Who am I that I should go to Pharaoh and bring the Israelites out of Egypt?"

And then Moses said, "*Suppose* I go to the Israelites - my emphasis - *suppose* I go to the Israelites and say to them, 'The God of your fathers is sent me to you,' and they ask me, 'What is his name?' Then what shall I tell them" *Suppose* I go... Okay.

And then in chapter four, Moses says, “Well, what if they don't believe me or listen to me, and they say, ‘The Lord did not appear to you.’”

Then he said, once more, ‘Pardon your servant Lord, I've never been eloquent, neither in the past nor since you've spoken to your servant, I'm slow of speech and tongue.” And then God tells them that he would help Moses speak and tell him what to say, at which point Moses says, “Pardon your servant, Lord, please send somebody else.’

Now, we're told that the Lord's anger burned against Moses. And he said, “Well, what about your brother Aaron, the Levite? I know he can speak well.” 

So at every turn, Moses questions God. This is not an auspicious beginning, clearly not the image of Moses, we think of - the image of a courageous, strong leader that Charlton Heston delivered in the movie, “The Ten Commandments.”

But here's the most serious issue. God had been preparing Moses to be the one to lead Israel out of captivity. Moses was to be the leader of this chosen people. And in doing so, Moses also would be God's representative to Pharaoh, and to all the nations that would hear of the things that were going to be happening in Egypt, to cause Pharaoh to finally let the Jewish people go. Therefore, Moses had to have his own house in order.

So it's in verse 24, that we read that God was going to kill Moses. And then in verses 25 and 26, we read, “But Zipporah took a flint knife, cut off her son's foreskin, and touched Moses' feet with it. ‘Surely you're a bridegroom of blood to me,’ she said. So the Lord let him alone. (At that time she said ‘bridegroom of blood,’ referring to circumcision.)”

So we know that Moses had not had his son circumcised. And he knew that he should have. Every Jewish male had to be circumcised. And it was the responsibility of every Jewish parent, especially Jewish *father*, to have this carried out. So Moses was sinning by not obeying this very fundamental command.

Moses had to learn that when God says something, he means it.

Now, immediately after we read of this event, we're told that God told Aaron to go into the wilderness to meet Moses. And when they met, Moses told Aaron everything that God had told him to say and about all the signs he had told him to perform. And this time I'm pretty sure that Moses had a new respect for, and conviction about, the mission that God had assigned him.

What do you think? 

[LIFESPRING FAMILY HOTLINE - 18:08]
Let me know your thoughts. Call the Lifespring Family Hotline at +1-951-732-8511. You can also comment at comment.lifespringmedia.com, or email me at steve@lifespringmedia.com. I do read every comment and there's a good chance I'll play your audio comment or read your comment right here on the show.

Tomorrow is History Tuesday, and we'll read 1 Samuel 16 through 20.

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[OUTRO S13E093 - 19:21]
Well, I'll tell you what, there's a good chance you're listening to this on January 2, and I'm recording the show on January 1, New Year's Day. And pretty much everything has shut down for the day, of course. Even the email detritus that normally clogs my email spam folder has slowed down to a trickle. So I'm going to make an executive decision to wrap this episode right here. My guess is that many of you are probably playing a bit of catch-up anyway with the show right now, so a shorter episode probably won't bother you. One thing I will say is that I love the Lifespring family and I'm looking forward to 2023 with you.

And with that, until tomorrow, may God bless you richly. Thank you for inviting me to be a part of your day. I can't wait to see you again tomorrow. My name is Steve Webb. Bye.

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Transcribed by https://otter.ai