Exodus 2:11-22 - A Redeemer in Exile

© Eric M Schumacher — Preached December 4, 2011 at Northbrook Baptist Church, Cedar Rapids, Iowa

Audio will be available here.

Thou who wast rich beyond all splendour, 

All for love's sake becamest poor; 

Thrones for a manger didst surrender, 

Sapphire-paved courts for stable floor. 

That classic Christmas hymn, based on 2 Corinthians 8:9, is a wonderful description of Jesus’ advent.

It also describes Moses in our passage. And, it describes how we, who believe in Jesus and are being conformed into his image, ought to live by faith.

40 Years in a Flash

Our text simply says, “One day, when Moses had grown up.” Acts 7 tells us that Moses is now forty years old. Our story unfolds in three parts.

Part 1 is found in verses 11-12: Grown up Moses goes out to the Israelites and looks on their burdens. He witnesses an Egyptian beating a Hebrew, one of his people. So, Moses, looking around to assure that no one is watching, kills the Egyptian and hides his body in the sand.

Part 2 is found in verses 13-15. The next day, Moses went out again and sees a Hebrew wrongly oppressing a Hebrew! Moses plays the role of reconciler, rebuking the one in the wrong, “Why do you strike your companion?”

To his surprise, his attempt at reconciliation is rejected. The rebuked man rejects his authority, “Who made you a prince and judge over us?” And then asks, “Do you mean to kill me as you killed the Egyptian?”

This question fills Moses with fear. His act of killing the Egyptian is known. It soon enough reached the ears of Pharaoh, who sought to kill Moses. 

Moses flees in exile to “the land of Midian.” Midian was in the northwest portion of the Arabian Peninsula, a large part of which was controlled by the Midianites, who were migrant herdsmen and shepherds. 

Part 3 is begins at a well, where Moses has sat down. In verse 16, we learn of a priest of Midian, Reuel, who had seven daughters. It was common for women to water the flocks, and so they came to the well.

In verse 17, the crisis arises. “The shepherds” drove the women away. They likely waited for the women to fill the troughs and then chased them away so that their flocks could drink the water. The women would be forced to wait and refill for their flocks after the shepherds had left. Moses saw the oppression of the women and he “stood up and saved them, and watered their flock.”

In verses 18-19, they come home to their father, who wonders why they have come home so early this day. They explain that an Egyptian delivered them out of the hand of the shepherds and watered their flocks. (Whether it was Moses’ language, dialect, or that he was clean-shaven—they recognized him as an Egyptian.)

So, in verse 20, Reuel asks, “Then where is he? Why have you left the man? Call him, that we may eat bread.” It would be dangerous for Moses to be left alone, at the mercy of the shepherds who have been put to shame by a single man in front of a crowd of women. Furthermore, in a culture that values hospitality, they are indebted to him for his actions.

“That we may eat bread” is an invitation to a meal—but probably also an invitation to live with them. That an Egyptian, alone in the wilderness, would defend Midianites (who were normally disliked) and shepherdesses (which Egyptians detested) probably signaled that Moses was in exile, on the run, homeless.

This is confirmed in verse 21. Moses is content to dwell with the man. And, Reuel gives his daughter, Zipporah, to Moses in marriage.

And, in verse 22, we read of the birth of another son, given a name of significance. Moses called his name “Gershom,” which means “a sojourner there,” because, Moses says, “I have been a sojourner in a foreign land.”

What’s the Point?

So, that is the story, simple-enough. But what should we learn and apply from this text?

Let me offer you three things the Bible intends for us see in Moses and how to apply each.

(1) First, in Moses, we see an offer of salvation that is rejected and despised by men.

Moses, by faith, offers himself as the one through whom God will save Israel. Verse 11 twice emphasizes that Moses saw the Israelites as his people.  “He went out to his people” and “he saw and Egyptian beating a Hebrew, one of his people.” Why mention twice what we already know?

In scene one, Moses is depicted as doing a work like God’s. The language of verse 11 is intentional—”Moses…went out to his people and looked on their burdens...” The reader of Exodus will recognize this language echoed in Exodus 4:31—“…they heard that the Lord had visited the people of Israel and that he had seen their affliction…” Moses going out to his people is parallel to Yahweh “visiting the people,” and Moses “looking on their burdens” is parallel to Yahweh, “seeing their affliction.” 

What was the word Reuel’s daughters brought to him of Moses’ actions? “[He] delivered us out of the hand of the shepherds.” The words for “save” and “deliver” are used later of the Lords work: “Thus Yahweh saved Israel that day from the hand of the Egyptians” (Ex 14:30). And, Reuel will echo this in Exodus 18:10, “Blessed be Yahweh, who has delivered you out of the hand of the Egyptians…” 

The author, Moses, wants the reader to see that he was intentionally identifying with and acting for his people.

Faith-Motivated Action?

Is that the right way to read this passage—that Moses is, by faith, consciously acting as God’s means of salvation? 

Moses, the author, has taught us to see each actor acting in faith as the story progresses. We saw a few weeks ago that the midwives “feared God” and so resisted Pharaoh. We saw that same faith evidenced in Moses’ mother last week. We should read the same behind Moses’ actions—even if he is too humble to state it outright.

Where would Moses get the idea that God would save Israel through him? We don’t know how much, if any, contact Moses had with the Israelites. He was raised by his Hebrew mother for 3-4 years. His reunion with Aaron and Miriam’s role in the Exodus both suggest a familiarity. It is possible that Moses was able to visit the Hebrews and knew his family.

It is also possible that he knows the history of the Hebrew people through his Egyptian instruction. Perhaps he has viewed the coffin of Joseph and knows of the prophecy that the Hebrew God will bring them out of Egypt, into their land. 

And, he has likely heard the story of his infancy rescue several times. 

It is not far-fetched to see that Moses came to understand and believe that God had preserved him to deliver the Hebrews—especially when there is a secret and sovereign hand orchestrating the story.

So, we should see that God put in into Moses’ heart to go out and identify with his people—he went out in faith, expecting God to save the Israelites through him. 

In Acts 7, Stephen will say:

When [Moses] was forty years old, it came into his heart to visit his brothers, the children of Israel. And seeing one of them being wronged, he defended the oppressed man and avenged him by striking down the Egyptian. He supposed that his brothers would understand that God was giving them salvation by his hand, but they did not understand.

Moses is a despised and rejected offer of salvation.

The Hebrews “did not understand,” and so rejected Moses as God’s salvation. When they ask, “Who made you a ruler and a judge over us?” they are denying that God has raised him up to be just that.

A Pattern of Rejection

This is not an isolated incident in the Old Testament. In Exodus through Deuteronomy, through Judges, the books of Samuel, Kings, Chronicles, and through the Prophets, the history of Israel is a history of the rejection of those through whom God proclaims and/or brings salvation.

A Pattern Fulfilled in Christ.

And so, this passage teaches us to expect that the ultimate offer of salvation, the Messiah, will be despised and rejected by men, especially by those to whom he is sent, his own people. 

And this is what we see when the greater Moses arrives to bring the true Exodus. Jesus was despised and rejected, driven “outside the camp,” cut off from the land of living. 

In his infancy, King Herod will try to kill him, even commanding a Pharaoh-like holocaust of Jewish sons in Bethlehem. In his ministry, he will come to his own and they will receive him not. In his death, the world unites to condemn and execute him.

But those who will receive him, he gives the right to become the children of God.

Beware of rejecting God’s offer of salvation in Jesus Christ.

That is the application Scripture itself makes of this passage. In Acts 7, Stephen uses this event as one piece in a long string of evidence, to make this indictment:

You stiff-necked people, uncircumcised in heart and ears, you always resist the Holy Spirit. As your fathers did, so do you. Which of the prophets did your fathers not persecute? And they killed those who announced beforehand the coming of the Righteous One, whom you have now betrayed and murdered...

Just as Moses was an offer of salvation, rejected by Israel—so is Jesus. Stephen is rebuking a people who thought they were following Moses by showing that they fall in line with those who rejected Moses—because they reject the Messiah, Jesus, of whom Moses wrote.

Might you be one of the “religious,” who think yourself to be a part of God’s people—but are ultimately rejecting his salvation?

How do we reject God’s offer of salvation today?

We reject it by rejecting the Gospel. Perhaps you are not a Christian; perhaps you even hate the idea of Jesus Christ being the only means by which you can be saved. Do you see that the Bible anticipates this? You are neither original nor sophisticated. Rather, you are a conformist who had thrown your lot in to follow the world, as it has always gone since the fall.

We reject it by refusing to identify with God’s people. Moses’ acceptance of God’s promises, propelled him to identify with Israel, even to the extent of renouncing Egypt.

You cannot receive God’s offer of salvation and refuse to identify with the others God has saved. Jesus told Saul on the Damascus road that when he persecuted the church, he was persecuting Christ. And the author of Hebrews warns that those who forsake assembling with God’s people are in danger of being in a place where there no longer remains a sacrifice for sins.

Friend, if you refuse to identify with God’s people, the church, the Bible depicts you as a person who has rejected Christ. 

We reject it by persecuting God’s people. But surely, you protest, persecution of Christians only happens in the Middle East!

Perhaps you persecute Christians by trying to get them to follow rules and customs the Bible does not require of believers. Your legalism not only antagonizes their faith, but subtly denies the sufficiency of faith in Christ—the Gospel.

Or, perhaps you persecute Christians through your freedom. You antagonize them by trying to get them to disobey their conscience and do the things you’re free to do! By your freedom you destroy the one for whom Christ died.

Friend, if you are persecuting God’s people—through your words, actions, inaction—you may fall in with those who are persecuting Christ.

Instead of rejecting, we should receive God’s offer of salvation in Jesus Christ by repenting and believing in him.

So, what does faith look like?

(2) In Moses, we see a model of faith in action.

By this, I mean three things: Moses:

(a) rejects citizenship in this world, along with its fleeting wealth and sinful pleasures, 

and (b) chooses to be mistreated with Christ and his people, 

because (c) it believes that God will keep his promises, which are better.

(a) Moses rejects his citizenship in Egypt, along with its fleeting wealth and sinful pleasures.

Moses’ decision to strike down the Egyptian is a clear act of identifying with the Hebrews as his people. It is therefore a renunciation of his Egyptian status, a refusal to be called the son of Pharaoh’s daughter—along with all the power, treasure, and pleasure offered in a royal court. 

Moses sees these pleasures, which sinful because they are only enjoyed through the mistreatment of slaves, and he refuses them. 

And what does he exchange those pleasures for?

(b) Moses chooses to be mistreated with Christ and his people.

Striking down the Egyptian clearly shows his loyalties lie with mistreated Hebrews.

But, why do I say he chooses to be mistreated with Christ? Who has Israel been presented as in this story so far? Israel is “the offspring of the woman,” who is hated by the offspring of the Serpent. 

Israel will be called God’s son. Therefore, when Moses chooses to be identified with God’s people, he chooses to be identified as the offspring of the woman. 

But, more than that, Moses emerges in this story line as the singular “seed”—the redeemer, representing the one man, the Seed, who will deliver the many. In this way, Moses is bearing the reproach that belongs to the Lord’s anointed.

Moses is saying that the reproach of the Seed is greater wealth than the wealth of the Serpent.

How could Moses say such a thing? It is because…

(c) Moses believed that God would keep his promises—and that those promises were better.

Moses has everything to lose and nothing to gain from a worldly perspective. This supports the idea, defending earlier, that Moses is living by faith in God’s promises. 

There is no other reason to act as he does. Moses can reject Egypt and identify with the persecuted people of God because he believes that the Lord will bring his people out of Egypt, into a land that he had prepared for them, a better land.

Is Moses a model of faith?

This is exactly how the author of Hebrews presents this story—as a model of faith. Hebrews 11:24-26:

By faith Moses, when he was grown up, refused to be called the son of Pharaoh's daughter, choosing rather to be mistreated with the people of God than to enjoy the fleeting pleasures of sin. He considered the reproach of Christ greater wealth than the treasures of Egypt, for he was looking to the reward.

Moses is a Christian hedonist. Looking for the reward, to the “better country,” Moses rejects citizenship in the world for citizenship with God’s people, even counting that reproach as better.

Israel—Faith FAIL!

This is something that Israel would repeatedly fail at, especially in the Exodus. As they reject Moses and Aaron’s authority, grumbling about their leadership and provision, they are ultimately expressing unbelief in God’s promises (Exodus 16:2-3). They will wish that, instead of redemption, they could be back enjoying the wealth, “the meat pots” and “bread” of Egypt.

Jesus 

Of course, where Israel failed (with Ada and the rest of us!), is where Jesus succeeds as the perfect “son of God.”

(a) Jesus rejected citizenship in this world, along with its fleeting wealth and sinful pleasures.

During Jesus’ wilderness wandering, the devil offered all the kingdoms of the world and their glory (Mt 4). But, Jesus refused sinful pleasure, choosing to glorify God, even if that meant hunger, thirst and death.

(b) Jesus chose to be mistreated and identified with the suffering people of God.

Throughout his time on earth, Jesus chose to be identified with outcasts and sinners. And their reproach fell upon him. Ultimately, he was willing to be cursed for the sins of others, bearing the iniquities and shame of those the Father gave to him. 

Why would Jesus renounce the world and bear such reproach?

(c) Jesus believed that God would keep his promises—promises that are better.

Hebrews 12:2 tells us that Jesus “endured the cross, despising the shame”—“for the joy that was set before him.” Jesus believed that what God promised was better than the wealth of the world. His assurance of things hoped for, his conviction of things not seen, motivated him to renounce the world and to identify with the shame of being God’s son.

Application

We are called to such faith—to believe the Gospel. We are to:

(a) …believe that Jesus has lived this for us and is eternal treasure.

We should believe that Jesus has trusted the Father, renounced the world and born shame perfectly. We should believe that his perfect record in this has been credited to us through faith. We should have confidence that when God looks at us, believers in Jesus, he does not see world-loving, sin-enjoying, rebels. Instead, he sees the perfection of Jesus covering us.

Therefore, we should have confidence that what God has promised us in Christ is sure and certain. Jesus has purchased it—it is finished.

We should believe that what we have in Christ—forgiveness, the Spirit, citizenship in Christ’s kingdom, a resurrection from the dead, life in a New Heavens and a New Earth, even God himself—is better than anything this world offers us. 

And such “joy set before us,” should propel us to:

(b) …renounce citizenship in this world, along with its fleeting wealth and sinful pleasures.

The supremacy of the Gospel should cause us to renounce sinful pleasures, as Moses did. We should see that although sin offers pleasure, it is fleeting and inferior.

The supremacy of the Gospel should cause us to renounce the fleeting wealth that moth and rust destroy, that chokes out the word of the Gospel. 

Jesus, Wisdom Incarnate, does not call us to live frugally in the first half of our lives so that we can live luxuriously in the later half. He calls us to live like no one else now—to take up our cross and die—because, later, at the return of Christ, we might live like no one else.

(c) …embrace being mistreated as and with the people of God, with Christ.

Because God’s promises are true, we can bear shame and reproach as we identify with Christ—in his hunger, sickness, nakedness and shame—as we care for his suffering body, the church.

We should, by faith, choose to count reproach with Christ as greater wealth.

The Gospel Sanctifies

Do you see what Moses, in the Torah, is teaching us? Sanctification is by grace through faith.

The grace of God trains us to refuse the world and live godly lives in the present age. Listen to Titus 2:11-15:

For the grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation for all people, training us to renounce ungodliness and worldly passions, and to live self-controlled, upright, and godly lives in the present age, waiting for our blessed hope, the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior Jesus Christ, who gave himself for us to redeem us from all lawlessness and to purify for himself a people for his own possession who are zealous for good works.

What Paul is saying here is that God’s grace, the good news of his promise of redemption, brings a true exodus.

Paul describes faith — in response to “the grace of God,” we are “waiting for our blessed hope.” And what does such faith do?

It trains us to do what Moses did. Moses’ faith in God’s gracious promise of redemption trained him to renounce ungodliness and live as God’s people. 

And Titus 2:10 says that the grace of God is “training us to renounce ungodliness and worldly passions, and to live self-controlled, upright, and godly lives in the present age, waiting for our blessed hope.” 

Faith—confidence in a better, blessed future—is what trains us to renounce sin and lead godly lives now—purified as “a people for his own possession, zealous for good works.”

This means that if you want to train yourself or disciple another to leave their sin and be willing to suffer hardship as Christ’s people—you should use the Gospel! Change does not come through brow-beating and guilt-trips, through lists rules and regulations, but through beholding the glory of God in his promises of grace, through the cultivation of a superior satisfaction in the Gospel.

The Torah teaches us that the Gospel alone sanctifies us. Sanctification happens when we believe God’s gracious promises. Faith changes how we live, which leads us to our final point.

(3) In Moses, we see a sojourner on mission.

Moses names his son Gershom, for he said, “I have been a sojourner in a foreign land.” This is Moses assessment of himself—a sojourner, an exile, an alien in a foreign land. It prompts the question: To what land is he referring?

I would suggest that Moses intends this statement to refer, not only to his time in Midian, but his time in Egypt and his status as an Israelite.

Moses’ homeland is not Egypt. When Moses was raised in an Egyptian home, he was exiled from his true people. Therefore, Moses has refused to be called the son of Pharaoh’s daughter. 

From the beginning of this text, when he identifies himself with the Hebrews, by faith, he is stating—“I have another homeland, one that God will give to me.” As a Hebrew, he is automatically an exile, a sojourner in a foreign land.

Missional

Moses’ awareness that he is a sojourner in Egypt is what motivates him to be missional. 

If Egypt is his home, he has no reason to leave and everything to lose. But, if Egypt is not his home and he has a better homeland waiting for him—then he is freed to renounce Egypt and pursue mission. He is free to renounce temporary wealth, to identify with God’s poor people. He is free to renounce his power and status in Egypt to bring God’s promised redemption to oppressed people. He is free to obey God and love people.

Jesus

In John’s Gospel, Jesus repeatedly emphasizes that he is “not of the world;” he is self-consciously a sojourner.

In his John 17 prayer, Jesus says, “And for their sake I sanctify myself.” To be sanctified means to be “single-mindedly devoted to God’s purposes.” 

Jesus’ sanctification, his single-minded devotion to God’s mission was fueled by his awareness that the world is not his home and confidence that God would give him something better.

To be missional, we must see ourselves as sojourners—exiled people temporarily residing in a foreign (and inferior) land.

The New Testament encourages us to see ourselves as sojourners. Jesus, in John 14, promised his people that through his work on the cross, he would prepare a place for them and come to get them. In John 17, he said that we are in the world but not of it. This world is not our home.

And such a status (and promise) calls and frees us to live missionally.

Missional Sojourning

By “missional,” I do not mean necessarily becoming a vocational missionary or a pastor (though it might mean those!) or that every other word that comes out of our mouths should be “Jesus.”

By “missional,” I mean being intentional with our schedules, our hobbies, our homes, our finances, our relationships at work, our neighbors, our friendships, our church relationships, our career choices. So that everything about our lives is single-mindedly devoted to God’s purpose to cover the earth with the knowledge of his glory through the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

By “missional,” I mean not shrinking from identifying with the suffering and oppressed, but serving them in Jesus’ name. I mean not fearing the reproach of the Gospel and the rejection of the world, but running to those oppressed by Satan and enslaved in sin—and bringing them the freedom of the Gospel. 

A Challenge

Let me challenge us all to examine ourselves. Is the reason that we shrink from mission—however that looks for each of us—that we are wrongly consumed with establishing “residency” in this world?

In the hustle and bustle of life, have we forgotten the fact that, as believers, we each have a room prepared by Jesus in the Father’s house, in a city whose designer and builder is God, in a better country, in a new heavens and new earth?

Teenagers - is your life structured around gaining a status among your peers—or around making Jesus famous among them?  

Singles - is the great goal of your unmarried years to pass your days and nights progressing in World of Warcraft, keeping up with American Idol or maintaining a certain BMI—or do you seize your extra time to model sojourner-faith to a youth, to a widow, to your non-Christian peers? 

Career-builders - does your life revolve around climbing the corporate ladder, building a nest-egg, and making your old man proud? Has your surprising success and new-found wealth begun to tempt you to view this world as home, and set-aside your the missional goals of your Christian youth? 

Middle-agers - has the fact that you are not where you pictured yourself being at this point in life thrown you into depression, seeing no hope to achieve your dreams? Or, are you reminding yourself that, like Moses, you are a sojourner here, that God has imputed to you Christ’s success—and, therefore, you are free to humbly serve as an ambassador for Christ? 

Parents - are you bitter, frustrated and angry because your children aren’t cooperating in your dream of “little pink houses for you and me,” of a Norman Rockwell family? Have you forgotten that, as a Christian, your houseful of children is not your home? That you belong to a better family and a better homeland—and that God has given you this spouse and these children so that you can show them what it means to hope in a better home? 

Empty-nester - with the kids out of the home, your free time will be filled for you, if you do not master it. Are you strategic in planning these days with a sojourner mindset? Is this your time? Or, is it an opportunity to gather some other, younger exiles around you and teach them how to live in the hope of a better home? 

Retirees - is your retirement an opportunity to make just a little more money, to get better at all your hobbies, to do all the things on your “bucket list,” believing that once you “kick-the-bucket” there is not another chance to enjoy this world? Or, do you live with the mindset that a glorious retirement, rest, is secured for you in Christ—with a new heavens and new earth to explore forever. Therefore, realizing this world is not your home, do you use what you have left to spread a passion for the glory of Jesus?

Each stage of life brings us unique temptations to forget we are in exile. But also, each stage in life brings us unique opportunities to live as sojourning ambassadors, on mission to a foreign land.

Northbrook, we have no abiding city here but we look for a city to come. Therefore, let us be a sanctified people—that is, a people who are single-mindedly devoted to God’s purposes in Christ, to spreading the Gospel and making disciples. 

Out of the security of our wealth—every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places, given to us in Christ—let us be missional. Let us run to the suffering, the poor, the weary, those lost in sin and death. Let us become poor, so that they might be made rich in Christ.