10. Moses’ Parents’ Faith

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Hymns: RHC 355 Day by Day Faith, 311 Does Jesus Care?, 336 Only Believe

 Hebrews 11:23 (KJV)

23  By faith Moses, when he was born, was hid three months of his parents, because they saw he was a proper child; and they were not afraid of the king’s commandment.

Moses’ Parents’ Faith

OUTLINE

  • Faith’s Wisdom
  • Faith’s Courage

INTRODUCTION

In 1968, Singapore had a population of 2 million. That year there were 47,241 babies born. The number of Israelites in Egyptian before the Exodus numbered possibly 2 million. And if there were 47, 000 babies born to the Israelites, there would have been massive killing that resulted in the extermination of a whole new generation of Israelites.

When Pharaoh decreed, commanding, to kill the male babies of the Israelites in Egypt by casting them into the river Nile, he was committing murder, transgressing the sixth commandment that the Israelites will receive from God through Moses in the wilderness after the Exodus from Egypt.

INFANCIDE – The Pharaoh decreed for massive killing of male infants. But their plan was thwarted because the midwives feared God and did not obey this cruel and inhumane decree to save the male infants alive.

What was the reason for such cruelty? They were afraid that the children of Israel will harm them by reason of their sheer numbers, they pose a threat to their Egyptian masters. Exodus 1:8 tells us – Now there arose up a new king over Egypt, which knew not Joseph.

Recall Joseph was Egypt’s prime minister, a foremost position of trust. After Joseph died, the time lapsed when the contribution of Joseph was forgotten, the sentiment of the Egyptians toward the children of Israel changed.

Exodus 1:9-10 And he said unto his people, Behold, the people of the children of Israel are more and mightier than we: Come on, let us deal wisely with them; lest they multiply, and it come to pass, that, when there falleth out any war, they join also unto our enemies, and fight against us, and so get them up out of the land.

 In order to curtail their rising strength, the Egyptians persecuted the Israelites.

 Exodus 1:11-14 Therefore they did set over them taskmasters to afflict them with their burdens. And they built for Pharaoh treasure cities, Pithom and Raamses. 12 But the more they afflicted them, the more they multiplied and grew. And they were grieved because of the children of Israel. 13 And the Egyptians made the children of Israel to serve with rigour: 14 And they made their lives bitter with hard bondage, in morter, and in brick, and in all manner of service in the field: all their service, wherein they made them serve, was with rigour.

That was not enough to sense of threat that the children of Israel posed to them.

15 And the king of Egypt spake to the Hebrew midwives, of which the name of the one was Shiphrah, and the name of the other Puah: 16 And he said, When ye do the office of a midwife to the Hebrew women, and see them upon the stools; if it be a son, then ye shall kill him: but if it be a daughter, then she shall live. 17 But the midwives feared God, and did not as the king of Egypt commanded them, but saved the men children alive. Ex 1:15-17

Moses was one of these babies saved.

In the events prior to the Israel’s exodus out of Egypt, the Israelites in Egypt experienced great sufferings. The affliction of Israel was a part of God’s plan to raise in Israel a national witness for Him.

A nation must consist of her people, a constitution and a land. God was fulfilling His plan step by step. It was in the land of Goshen that God allowed 70 of the family of Jacob to sojourn by the patronage of his son Joseph to grow into a large multitude of people so that by the time of the exodus, they were as many as 2 million.[1] Persecution and affliction did not cause God’s people to be defeated and fizzled out of existence but caused them to draw closer to their God in prayer. This was the Israel’s testimony in Egyptian bondage.

The story of the faith of one Jewish couple whose son Moses, was set, to influence the course of His people’s destiny, as the man whom God would call to deliver Israel from their bondage in Egypt.

This is the story of Moses’ birth…

 

Two thoughts

  • Faith’s Wisdom
  • Faith’s Courage

 

23  By faith Moses, when he was born, was hid three months of his parents, because they saw he was a proper child; and they were not afraid of the king’s commandment.

Moses’ parents were of the tribe of Levi. His father Amram and mother Jochebed. The name “Jechobed” means “glory of Jehovah” or “Jehovah (is her or our glory)”. Amram died at 137 years of age.

Exodus 6:18 And the sons of Kohath; Amram, and Izhar, and Hebron, and Uzziel: and the years of the life of Kohath were an hundred thirty and three years.

Exodus 6:20 And Amram took him Jochebed his father’s sister to wife; and she bare him Aaron and Moses: and the years of the life of Amram were an hundred and thirty and seven years.

Exodus 2:1-2 (KJV) 1  And there went a man of the house of Levi, and took to wife a daughter of Levi. 2  And the woman conceived, and bare a son: and when she saw him that he was a goodly child, she hid him three months.

Numbers 26:58-59 These are the families of the Levites: the family of the Libnites, the family of the Hebronites, the family of the Mahlites, the family of the Mushites, the family of the Korathites. And Kohath begat Amram. And the name of Amram’s wife was Jochebed, the daughter of Levi, whom her mother bare to Levi in Egypt: and she bare unto Amram Aaron and Moses, and Miriam their sister.

Moses was the youngest of the three siblings, Miriam the eldest sister.

Herbert Lockyer gave this insightful description of Jechobed, “She bore and suckled all three on the same strong milk, till she weaned them from milk and put them on the marrow of lions. The oak has its roots around the rock, the children of Jochebed had their roots around their godly mother.

There was Moses, who became one of the greatest national leaders and legislators the world has ever known. There was Aaron, who became Israel’s first high priest and the founder of the Aaronic priesthood. There was Miriam, the gifted poetess and musician, who was intimately associated with her two brothers in the history of Israel.

Jechobed’s prominent place in the divine gallery is secure, then, and the aspect of her career especially emphasized in Scripture is that of her clever design to preserve the life of her baby boy. It was for her courage and trust in such an act that had far-reaching consequences for the nation that she is placed among the heroines of faith in Hebrews 11:23. Let us recall the circumstances of the preservation of Moses which caused his mother to be included among that “great cloud of witnesses” whose lives and labours testified of their faith in God’s providential care and goodness.”[2]

The story is well related by Lockyer, “At the time of Pharaoh, the Hebrews had multiplied so greatly as to cause the monarch to fear lest they should outnumber the Egyptians and take over the nation. Thus, he commanded that all newly-born Hebrew boys be thrown into the Nile – a most dastardly edict! Jechobed was heavy with child. Already there were Miriam, about ten years of age at the time, and Aaron, possibly about three, in the home. Now another child was on the way. Knowing of Pharaoh’s command and that, as a rigid executive, he closely checked up on all male births, Jechobed must have had intense suspense as she awaited her third child. Would it be a boy that would be wrenched from her and thrown into the Nile? What were her feelings when the child was born and the midwife told her it was a boy? What maternal grief must have been hers!

But the horror of that crocodile-infested Nile transforms Jochebed into a heroine and the preserver of a boy who became one of the world’s greatest figures. The moment she saw her baby, she was determined to fight for his life. Three times ober we read that “she saw that he was a goodly child” (Exodus 2:2; Acts 7:20; Hebrews 11:23). This means that Moses was not only a lovely child to look at, but also, as the margin explains,  he was “fair to God,” implying that there was something other-worldly or anfelic about his features. As the little ones lay in her lap, Jochebed felt that he had been sent from God, and that He, along with her mingled faith and love, would somehow preserve the child.

How Jochebed managed to hide her baby, who doubtless cried as lustily as other babies, in some secret place where he could not be seen or heard, is a mystery! When she was unable to conceal him any longer, “God through the intensity of her faith caused her to inherit a vision of what He had appointed for Moses.” She made a little cradle of plaited reeds which were believed to be protection against crocodiles, then placed the rushes at the river’s bank, and told Miriam her younger daughter to stand near to watch over the small craft. The brief but vivid account of what happened is given by the historian, even by Moses Himself who, in his latter years, by divine inspiration, wrote the first five books of the Bible.

Exodus 2:3-10 (KJV)  3  And when she could not longer hide him, she took for him an ark of bulrushes, and daubed it with slime and with pitch, and put the child therein; and she laid it in the flags by the river’s brink. 4  And his sister stood afar off, to wit what would be done to him.

 Lockyer further narrated well, “At her usual time Pharaoh’s daughter came to the feathery greenness edging the ancient Nile to wash herself, and her maidens walking by the river side saw the cradle among the rushes.

 Exodus 2:5 5  And the daughter of Pharaoh came down to wash herself at the river; and her maidens walked along by the river’s side; and when she saw the ark among the flags, she sent her maid to fetch it.

 “When the royal lady saw the beautiful baby and heard his cry she had compassion on him.”

 Exodus 2:6-7 6  And when she had opened it, she saw the child: and, behold, the babe wept. And she had compassion on him, and said, This is one of the Hebrews’ children. 7  Then said his sister to Pharaoh’s daughter, Shall I go and call to thee a nurse of the Hebrew women, that she may nurse the child for thee?

 “A Hebrew woman must be found to nurse the child. Jochebed was fearfully watching the fate of that precious child she had borne and the rough cradle she had fashioned. Young Miriam was also near at hand, and quite naively said to Pharaoh’s daughter, “Shall I go and call to thee a nurse of the Hebrew women, that she may nurse the child for thee.”

 Exodus 2:8-10 8  And Pharaoh’s daughter said to her, Go. And the maid went and called the child’s mother. 9  And Pharaoh’s daughter said unto her, Take this child away, and nurse it for me, and I will give thee thy wages. And the woman took the child, and nursed it. 10  And the child grew, and she brought him unto Pharaoh’s daughter, and he became her son. And she called his name Moses: and she said, Because I drew him out of the water.

“Pharaoh’s daughter said, “Go!” Miriam was not long in calling her mother and presenting her as a nurse. Pharaoh’s daughter asked her to nurse the child for her at a given wage. Thus, Jochebed’s baby was not only saved, but Jochebed was paid to care for him until he was weaned. Pharaoh’s daughter must have loved the child for she brought him up as her son. Howeverm Moses later refused to be called the son of Pharaoh’s daughter, even though she had given him her name, Moses, which means “drawn out of the water” (Exodus 2:10). If Jochebed was guided by God to make that small cradle and place her three-month old baby in it, and hide him among the rushes, surely the steps of Pharaoh’s daughter were ordered by the same God, even though she was an idolator. It was to her that Jochebed owed the saving of her son, as well as the royal protection and all the advantages of Pharaoh’s palace as his home for the first forty years of his life.

How long Jochebed lived after her delivered child no longer required her nursing, we are not told. Doubtless she was dead by the time Moses fled into the wilderness when he was forty years of age. Although she did not live to see how famous her children became, dead, she yet spake again in their utter devotion to God. She had lived her life as unto Him, and her sons and daughter lit their torches at her flame. Jochebed was the chief influence unto God in their preparation for the great tasks they were to accomplish in leading His people out of Egyptian bondage. It was Jochobed’s love, faith and courage that saved her child from a cruel death and preserved him to bless the world. A mother who loves the Saviour, and who has a more severe anguish when she knows that, not the life of her child is at stake, but its soul, can rest in the assurance that Jochebed’s God still lives, and is able to save her dear one from eternal death.”[3]

 

CONCLUSION

Thank God for godly parents who by faith prepared the next generation to pass on the faith. Amen.

 

[1] 31 And Joseph said unto his brethren, and unto his father’s house, I will go up, and shew Pharaoh, and say unto him, My brethren, and my father’s house, which were in the land of Canaan, are come unto me; 32 And the men are shepherds, for their trade hath been to feed cattle; and they have brought their flocks, and their herds, and all that they have. 33 And it shall come to pass, when Pharaoh shall call you, and shall say, What is your occupation? 34 That ye shall say, Thy servants’ trade hath been about cattle from our youth even until now, both we, and also our fathers: that ye may dwell in the land of Goshen; for every shepherd is an abomination unto the Egyptians. Gen 46:31-34

[2] Herbert Lockyer, All the Men and Women of the Bible, Zondervan, 1967, 80.

[3] Herbert Lockyer, All the Men and Women of the Bible, Zondervan, 1967, 81.