Passage: Exodus 2

The Big Idea

Moses was born into slavery under a death sentence, yet his parents acted in faith, and God turned the enemy’s river of death into the place of his rescue. The little ark of reeds is a picture of Jesus, the only place of safety from death. Then Moses, grown and confident, tries to deliver Israel in his own strength and fails. God isn’t in a hurry. He spends forty years emptying Moses of self-sufficiency, and all the while He remembers His covenant. Our confidence rests on His promise, not our performance.

Parents of Faith (Exodus 2:1-2)

A man from the tribe of Levi married a Levite woman. She conceived and bore a son. When she saw that he was a beautiful child, she hid him for three months.

His parents were Amram and Jochebed (Exodus 6:20).
He was born into slavery and sorrow. Bad circumstances. No visible hope.
But he had parents of faith.

Hebrews says that by faith Moses’ parents hid him for three months, because they saw he was a beautiful child, and they weren’t afraid of the king’s command (Hebrews 11:23).

They didn’t hide him just because they loved him. Faith was at work. Faith comes by hearing the Word of God (Romans 10:17), and they had God’s promises passed down through their family.
They made a decision to believe those promises, and that faith shaped their actions and affections.
Soldiers were looking for baby boys. But they were not afraid. Knowing God’s promises destroys the fear of man. In God I trust; what can man do to me? (Psalm 56:11; Psalm 118:6; Hebrews 13:6)

Some researchers point to burial evidence in the region of Goshen that seems to fit this story: a period when people died younger, and then a time when female burials far outnumbered males. Whatever one makes of the details, Scripture tells us plainly what Pharaoh did.

An Ark in the River (Exodus 2:3-4)

When she couldn’t hide him any longer, she made a basket of papyrus reeds, coated it with tar and pitch, put the child in it and set it among the reeds by the bank of the Nile. His sister stood at a distance to see what would happen.

What does living by faith look like?

You look at God’s promises, then at your situation, and you do what lines up with His will.
They hid him as long as it made sense. Then they needed a new plan.
Changing plans doesn’t mean they were wrong. You walk each step with God and trust Him to direct your path. We plan our way, but the Lord directs our steps (Proverbs 16:9).

The Hebrew word for this basket is the same word used for Noah’s ark. Didn’t God save our family with an ark before? It made sense to them, so they did it in faith. God isn’t asking you to figure everything out. He’s looking for faith.

A picture of salvation

The Nile was where the baby boys were being killed. It was a place of death.
And that’s exactly where Moses had to go to be saved: into the ark.
The ark is a picture of Jesus. We also have to face the place of death and admit our sin deserves it.
But if we’re in the ark, we’re saved. The ark goes into death and protects everyone inside.

Paul tells us to count ourselves dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus (Romans 6:11). The wages of sin is death, but God’s gift is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord (Romans 6:23). There is no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus (Romans 8:1). As in Adam all die, so in Christ all will be made alive (1 Corinthians 15:22). Notice: made alive. It’s done to us. It’s His work, His power, given and never earned.

There’s one way to be saved. One ark. Jesus only.

It’s not about me trying to be more faithful, more important, more sincere, more committed or more knowledgeable. Knowledge puffs up, but love builds up (1 Corinthians 8:1), and especially God’s love for me.
It’s only about Him. I keep my eyes on the One who is always faithful, and His grace carries me through and changes me. If we are faithless, He remains faithful (2 Timothy 2:13).
Our one job is to abide in Him (John 15:4-5).

What if I struggle with doubt or worry?

Picture two people on the same airplane. One is at peace; the other is terrified the whole flight. They both arrive safely. The pilot was the same for both. But one enjoyed the trip, and the other endured troubles he never needed to have.

This isn’t about salvation; they both got on the plane. It’s about how we experience the journey. The more we trust the Pilot, the more fruitful and restful our lives become. Paul wanted to run the race to win (1 Corinthians 9:24).

Turned for Good (Exodus 2:5-10)

Pharaoh’s daughter came down to bathe in the Nile. She saw the basket among the reeds and sent her servant to bring it. When she opened it, the baby was crying, and she felt sorry for him. “This is one of the Hebrew babies,” she said. His sister stepped up and asked, “Shall I go and find one of the Hebrew women to nurse him for you?” “Yes, go,” she said. So the girl brought the baby’s own mother. Pharaoh’s daughter said, “Take this child and nurse him for me, and I’ll pay you.”

God took what the enemy meant for destruction and turned it into blessing. Moses’ mother even got paid to raise her own son!
That’s how faith changes the world. It gives God room to work.
God delights in overturning the enemy’s plans. The eyes of the Lord search the whole earth to strongly support those whose hearts are fully His (2 Chronicles 16:9).

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

Those early years at home are likely when Moses learned his people’s history and God’s promises.
God had told Abraham his descendants would be afflicted in a foreign land four hundred years, and then come out (Genesis 15:13-16). The time was drawing near.

Forty Years Ahead of God (Exodus 2:11-15)

When Moses had grown up, he went out to his own people and watched their hard labor. He saw an Egyptian beating a Hebrew. He looked this way and that, saw no one, killed the Egyptian and hid him in the sand.

What was Moses thinking? Stephen tells us. When Moses was forty, he decided to visit his fellow Israelites, defended one who was being wronged and struck down the Egyptian. He assumed his people would understand that God was using him to deliver them, but they didn’t (Acts 7:23-25).

Moses was in a hurry. He was forty years ahead of God.
He was acting in the flesh, in his own strength and pride.
Moses spent forty years becoming somebody. Then God spent forty years making him a nobody, so he could become who God had purposed him to be.
God is not in a hurry. He cares more about your heart than about any work that needs doing. The High and Lofty One who lives in eternity dwells with the humble and contrite (Isaiah 57:15).
Moses wasn’t humble yet. He was trained in the best schools, wealthy and blessed. The historian Josephus even records a tradition that Moses was a famous general who led Egypt’s army against Ethiopia.

Moses saw the right problem, and he had already made some great choices. Hebrews says that by faith he refused to be called the son of Pharaoh’s daughter, choosing to suffer with God’s people rather than enjoy the passing pleasures of sin. He considered reproach for Christ greater riches than Egypt’s treasures, because he looked to the reward (Hebrews 11:24-27).

His heart had chosen God. But he went about it the wrong way, and he got impatient. Part of him still trusted the sufficiency of his own flesh.

So Moses would wait another forty years in the desert. Not as punishment, but as development. Training. Detox from self-sufficiency.

Be patient in your seasons of trial. God is working in your heart. Nothing is wasted with God.
God couldn’t let Israel’s deliverance come by human strength. That would ruin the picture of Jesus. The deliverance can come only by Him. That’s also why we can’t be used while we’re trusting in our flesh.

The next day Moses saw two Hebrews fighting and asked the one in the wrong, “Why are you hitting your neighbor?” The man shot back, “Who made you ruler and judge over us? Are you going to kill me like you killed the Egyptian?” Moses was afraid: “This is known!” When Pharaoh heard, he tried to kill Moses. So Moses fled to the land of Midian, and he sat down by a well.

Moses must have felt crushed and discouraged. That’s how we all feel when we see what our flesh can really accomplish.
But he did a good thing. He sat down by a well.
That pictures us going back to the Wellspring of Life after we fail. Jesus said, “If anyone thirsts, let him come to Me and drink” (John 7:37). Are you doing that? Watch what God provides.

Becoming a Servant (Exodus 2:16-22)

The priest of Midian had seven daughters. They came to draw water for their father’s flock, but some shepherds drove them away. Moses stood up, rescued them and watered their flock.

Midian was descended from Abraham through Keturah (Genesis 25:1-2), so this priest may well have worshiped the true God.
Moses was already becoming a servant. That’s the first step to leading people.

Their father Reuel asked why they were home so early. “An Egyptian rescued us from the shepherds, and even drew water for us.” “Then where is he? Why did you leave him? Invite him to eat!” Moses agreed to stay, and Reuel gave him his daughter Zipporah in marriage. She bore a son, and Moses named him Gershom, saying, “I have become a foreigner in a foreign land.”

Through these years God was giving Moses a heart for the people he’d one day lead, as a shepherd in the wilderness.
Is that why you’re going through a hard season?

God Remembered (Exodus 2:23-25)

After a long time, the king of Egypt died. The Israelites groaned under their slavery and cried out, and their cry rose to God. God heard their groaning, and God remembered His covenant with Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. God saw the Israelites, and God took notice of them.

God never forgot them. “Remembered” means He was about to act.
God is compassionate toward His people. But notice the reason for His mercy: His covenant.
Not because they deserved it. Not because of their ethnicity. Not because of their sincerity or anything they had done. Simply because He made a promise, and He always keeps His Word.

Why do you trust the Lord so much? Why are you so sure He’ll hear your prayers and help you? Because He has proven He loves me and made promises I can count on.

That sounds crazy? Think about engagement. A whole industry runs on it. Someone says he loves you, makes a promise and puts a ring on your finger, and you start living your whole life on that promise. (Why did God make Saturn? He liked it, so He put a ring on it.)

God’s declaration of love is told in detail in four Gospels.
His engagement ring, His promise, is just as real: the changed heart and the Holy Spirit given to us as a pledge of what’s to come (Ephesians 1:13-14). Invisible on the outside, but real.

If your time of “engagement” to Jesus doesn’t feel very exciting, what’s wrong? Jesus told the church in Ephesus they had left their first love, and called them to remember and return (Revelation 2:4-5).

Remember, this is a covenant. He has promised to be your Bridegroom. He did all the work the covenant required, with His own blood. He always remembers you. He always takes notice of you. He will never leave you or forsake you.

So open your Bible and read it the way a bride reads her fiancé’s love letters. Pray like a wife talking to her husband who’s far away.

Grace Takeaway

Moses was saved by an ark in the river of death, and so are we: Jesus went into death and carries everyone who is in Him through to life. Moses’ own strength failed, and ours will too, but God isn’t in a hurry and He wastes nothing. He hears our groaning and remembers His covenant, not because we’ve earned it, but because He promised. Get in the ark, sit down by the Well, and live like someone who’s been promised everything by a faithful Bridegroom.

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The Twists and Turns of Living by Faith