Every nation has its heroes. George Washington, for example, is a name that every American child knows, and why not? He was a formidable general and our nation’s first president. Is your name one that every school child will one day know as well? There’s George Washington and then there’s (call out the names of a couple people present). Don’t think the people I just named will ever be as famous? Maybe not. Such recognition is reserved for those who accomplish something really important.
However, we’re starting a sermon series today that focuses on the biblical truth that each one of us is important even if we never accomplish anything the world thinks is worthwhile. You could say that each of us has been made for more—for more than just surviving from one day to the next. This was something Moses found out. He went from being a cry baby (that’s what he was doing when he was “discovered”) to being God’s premier prophet and leader of the Israelites. For the next twelve weeks, we’ll study the life of Moses to see how he (and we) are “made for more.”
We were of course all made by God for the purpose of serving and praising him—but not in a slave-ish way, as if God just needed a bunch of gardeners, janitors, and maids to do his bidding. Rather, we’re like the Grand Canyon, the Swiss Alps, and the Great Barrier Reef—things of beauty God made to bring glory to himself. But just as the natural wonders of this world can be ruined by pollution, humanity lost the beauty it once had because of sin. Only God can make us morally beautiful again. He does this by drawing us out of this world to draw us in to himself. Let’s see how God literally did that for Moses in today’s text.
Moses was born about 3,500 years ago—shortly after a new dynasty had taken power in Egypt. This new dynasty was not good for the Israelites who had been living in Egypt for over 300 years. Do you remember how they got there in the first place? Joseph, the son of Jacob, had been sold into slavery by his brothers who were jealous of the attention he received from their father. God was with Joseph, however, and he eventually went from slave to sultan—second in power only to the pharaoh. Thanks to his administrative prowess, Joseph brought much wealth to the pharaoh. However, when a new pharaoh from a new dynasty took over, he didn’t acknowledge the service Joseph had given. On the contrary, he saw Joseph’s descendants as a threat. At first, he tried to deal with the “problem” by making the Israelites do the backbreaking work of making and hauling bricks for several building projects. But just as an egg only hardens when you boil it, the backbreaking work only strengthened the Israelites and made them increase even more. Undeterred, Pharaoh next instructed two midwives, Shiphrah and Puah, to kill the Hebrew baby boys the moment they were born. But these women respected God more than they feared this pharaoh. They refused to kill any babies.
There is something worth bringing to your attention here. The second book of the Bible, from which our text is taken today, is not called “Exodus” in the Hebrew Bible. It goes by the title: “And these are the names.” The title comes from the first two words of the book. What then follows are the names of Jacob and his 12 sons. The only other names listed in Exodus 1 are the two faith-filled midwives: Shiphrah and Puah. The pharaoh, on the other hand, is NOT named even though he may have been the mighty Pharaoh Ahmose I (c. 1539-1514 B.C.)* who expelled the Hyksos, the former Asiatic rulers of Egypt. Ahmose I also extended Egyptian control over present-day Sudan and restored neglected temples and trade routes. But as far as God was concerned, because of his persecution of his chosen people, Ahmose I was a nobody. The midwives, Shiphrah and Puah, who carried out their work faithfully and in humble service to others were more important to God than the pharaoh. Their names, and not the name of the pharaoh, are recorded in the Bible.
Do you feel like a nobody? Is the job that you have, the social circle you run in considered to be on the margins, like a forgotten forestry road? Don’t fret it. Be faithful in serving your God and doing what is right. God knows and sees. And in time, God will acknowledge your faithful work. You have been made for more—to serve the King of kings. Even if no one else in the world thinks that you are very important, he does. But conversely, if you are opposed to God and are not doing his will, don’t think that your high social standing or your fat bank account means anything. Repent and humble yourself. Jesus was not kidding when he said the first will be last and the last will be first.
Although Pharaoh was thwarted by two seemingly lowly midwives, he did not stop attacking God’s people. If the midwives wouldn’t help him kill Hebrew baby boys, then he would order the Egyptian public to throw the boys into the Nile River to drown them. It was after this edict had been issued that Moses was born.
Can you imagine what it must have been like for Moses’ mother when she found out she was pregnant? Perhaps she prayed that she would have another girl. But God blessed her with a boy. Yet she believed, as all God’s people do, that every child is a blessing from God—even a child born under the most trying circumstances. What an excellent example she serves for God-fearing mothers of all ages, as she was willing to give her life to save the life of that child by hiding him from the eyes of the Egyptian soldiers.
But as the child grew older, his cries became louder. Soon he would be heard by the Egyptian patrols and they would show no mercy—throwing Moses into the river with the rest of the infant boys. What could she do? There was nothing she could do except commit this child the Lord’s care. So she made a basket out of papyrus reeds and made it water tight. She placed the precious little child into the basket, and placed it in the weeds along the riverbank.
It doesn’t seem to be a coincidence that the original Hebrew calls this basket an “ark.” The only other time that word is used in the Bible is for that big barge of a boat that Noah built to save himself and the animals from a world-wide flood. Likewise, God would use a mini ark to keep Moses safe. And it was no accident that Pharaoh’s daughter chose that place in the river to bathe. Nor was it dumb luck that she would feel compassion for the little boy. A loving God had brought her there and opened her heart so that Moses could live.
Do you see parallels here with your situation? Moses had been destined for death—the king had decreed it. But when the princess, Pharaoh’s own daughter, insisted on adopting this Hebrew baby boy, what was he going to say? Did he at least make his daughter promise she would do extra chores to pay for raising the child? Like Moses, we too were destined for death because of a holy decree from the King of all creation. Unlike Pharaoh’s murderous decree, God has every right to hold us accountable for every sin we commit, just as you would hold someone accountable for breaking into your house and harming your family. But then the Prince of Peace Jesus intervened. He claimed us as his own and he insisted on paying the price to keep us in the palace—the price of his own blood. With such love and dedication towards us, what is the Prince’s heavenly Father or anyone else for that matter going to say? The Apostle Paul’s takes up this point when he wrote about the certainty of our salvation: “Who then is the one who condemns? No one. Christ Jesus who died—more than that, who was raised to life—is at the right hand of God and is also interceding for us.” (Romans 8:34) [The previous paragraph of course does not mean to imply that God the Father is reluctant to take us in as members of his family. It was he who willingly sent his Son to die for us.]
The detail about Moses’ rescue that tickles me the most is how Moses’ sister Miriam ran up to the princess and offered to find a nurse for the child. When the princess agreed, who should Miriam bring back? Moses’ own mother! Consider how she not only got her son back, she now was going to be paid to care for a prince of Egypt! Friends, especially you mothers and fathers, the children with whom God has blessed us are a sacred trust. And they too are princes and princesses of the most high God. There is no room for carelessness or neglect as we care and provide for them as children who belong, above all, to the Lord. There is no room for selfishness, as if our needs are greater than the needs of our children. There is no room for thinking that our children are a toilsome burden instead of a joyous gift and blessing from our heavenly Father.
The truth still remains, however, that no matter how careful, how loving, or how diligent we are there comes a time when our hands will fail as we care for our children. So what are we to think then when the unthinkable happens—when our children suffer injury, or should even be taken from us in death? Has God let us down? No, dear friends. There must have been a lot of boys among the Hebrews who weren’t rescued, as Moses was. And this is a point that I will come back to throughout this series. The true story of Moses and the Israelites is not: if you obey God, you will always come out on top in this life. For starters, like Moses and the Israelites we don’t always obey God. And secondly, God has never promised believers an easy life. Even if God allowed many Hebrew baby boys to drown in the Nile River, if those boys’ parents had been carrying out their spiritual responsibilities, they would have imparted faith to these children so that God brought those boys home to care for them in heaven.
So how about it, fellow parents? Is the spiritual nurturing of your children more important to you than their physical upbringing? Your children were made for more—for more than wearing the latest fashions or carrying the latest techno gadget. Can they find their way around the Bible the way they can navigate social media? Do they know the Lord’s Prayer and what it means as well as they know the moves to the latest dance craze on TikTok? If not, why not? Their school teachers won’t impart the spiritual knowledge they need. And I doubt their friends are much help in this area. Instead, it will take some time and effort on your part to give them the spiritual nurturing that they need.
To this end, Moses’ mother sets a good example. Moses’ mother didn’t have much time with her son—three or four years at most, during which she would nurse and diaper him and prepare him to live with Pharaoh’s daughter. She most certainly used those young and impressionable years to also instill in her son those precious promises of a Savior that God had given to his people through the patriarchs. She taught him who the true God is, the Creator of all things, the God of covenant who would send the Messiah as the Redeemer of all people, the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. And when she could do no more, when her hands failed because she had no more time to spend with Moses, she entrusted his spiritual care to her great and loving God who could keep her son’s faith alive even while he lived under Pharaoh’s godless roof. And God did keep Moses safe. Listen to what the Bible says of Moses in the book of Hebrews: “By faith Moses when he had grown up refused to be known as the son of Pharaoh’s daughter. He chose to be mistreated along with the people of God rather than enjoy the pleasures of sin for a short time. He regarded disgrace for the sake of Christ of greater value than the treasures of Egypt” (11:24-26).
God planted a seed of faith in her Moses’ young heart through his mother’s tireless witness. The best schools in Egypt probably tried to erase it. The pleasures of life in fast lane of the palace of Pharaoh undoubtedly tried to trash it. But God caused that seed to grow, mature, and to withstand the temptations of the world into which he was thrown.
If you have been neglecting this most important part of bringing up your children, then run to Jesus to find the forgiveness he offers freely to all of us. Be grateful for the opportunity to start anew, and sit down with your children tonight and tend to their spiritual needs as diligently as you have tended to their physical needs.
To ensure that this happens, God himself of course has to intervene in our lives, even as he did in the life of Moses. The name “Moses” is telling. The Egyptian princess gave him that name—a name which means “drawn out.” He was given that name because he was “drawn out” of the water of the Nile River to be saved and to one day live in the palace. In a sense we’re all “Moses” that is, all who are baptized have been drawn out by divinely-touched water and brought into God’s family.
And like Moses, we too have received a name change. The name that stuck with Moses was not whatever name his parents had originally given to him but one the princess had assigned—a name that would forever remind Moses of his divinely-engineered rescue. The world has perhaps called you many names—some of them not so nice. But God overrides those names by calling you as his own beloved son and daughter. He has drawn you out of this world and draws you to himself through Jesus. You have indeed been made AND re-made for more—to glorify your Maker and Redeemer, and to one day live with him forever in his glorious palace. Amen.
* Regarding the dating of the events in Exodus, Professor Ken Cherney of Wisconsin Lutheran Seminary wrote in a January 2023 email:
The date of the exodus (with which this question is bound up, of course) is a very hot topic. In my opinion, the short answer to your question of can we be sure that Ahmose I was the pharaoh at the beginning of the Exodus account? The answer is "No."
Here's the short version. The so-called "late date" for the exodus puts it in the 13th century, when the pharaoh would have been Ramesses II. This fits well with the Israelites building storage cities at "Pithom" and "Ramses" (Ex 1:11). The latter has been convincingly identified as Piramesse, where Ramesses II undertook massive building projects. With some notable exceptions, the late date is the consensus view among people who think an exodus happened at all.
The problem, of course, is that the "480 years" of 1 Kgs 6:1 seems to push this back. Correlating Solomon's Year 4 with Assyrian absolute dating puts it at 966/7, so that's where you get a date for the exodus of 1446/7. If that's right, then yes, Thutmose III would be the pharaoh of the plagues.
My opinion is that you have two choices. You can take the late date and interpret the "480 years" thematically/symbolically, something like the "14's" in Jesus's genealogy. Or you can take the early date and take "Ramses" in Ex 1:11 as an editorial update that can be no older than the 13th century. Either way, I am not comfortable making the early date into some kind of test of orthodoxy, although some conservatives are very happy to do this.
There's more than that involved, of course. Like I said—short version.
SERMON NOTES
(pre-service warm up) We’re starting a sermon series on Moses. List at least three things you know about Moses. Then list at least one thing you’re interested in learning about this prophet and leader of Israel.
The Hebrew name for the book of Exodus is ________________________.
How does that title help you understand what God thought about the “lowly” midwives Shiphrah and Puah? The “mighty” pharaoh? And what God thinks about you?
Moses was born soon after Pharaoh’s edict that every Hebrew baby boy should be thrown into the Nile River and drowned. How did Moses’ mother demonstrate that every child is a blessing from God—even a child born under the most trying circumstances?
The original Hebrew calls the basket in which Moses was placed an ______________. Why does this seem to be intentional?
A princess of Egypt, Pharaoh’s own daughter, rescued and adopted Moses. What parallels do you see with your spiritual situation?
In a divinely engineered twist, the princess hired Moses’ own mother to nurse him. Parents, how is it true that you also are caring for princes and princesses?
Moses escaped death by drowning but there must have been many other baby boys who did die because of Pharaoh’s horrible edict. What can you be doing better to prepare your children (and grandchildren, siblings, etc.) for the day they face death?
God himself of course prepares us for death. He does so by drawing us out of this world to draw us to himself. What similarities do you see between Moses’ rescue and the rescue we have experienced through baptism?
