Posted on by Abe Austin

Scriptural Analysis- Exodus 2:2-4

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.

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.

Moses’s mother had to hide him because of the Pharaoh’s murderous decree. Every newborn male was to be killed by the Egyptians. I wonder how she managed to keep an infant, prone to sudden bouts of crying, unknown from the rest of the world. What terrifying days those must have been!

Of course, as the child grew he only became more and more difficult to conceal. Moses’s mother had a terrible choice to make: keep her child under her care and almost certainly consign him to death, or turn him over to God’s mercy. Her final gift to her son was a little ark, carefully sealed so no water could get inside. It seemed to be the last home she could provide him.

I think the final words in verse four illustrate the grim uncertainty with which Moses parted ways from his family. His sister watched to know “what would be done to him.” Starvation, drowning, being eaten by a wild animal, found and killed by an Egyptian guard…all manner of tragic endings were possible. As we will see tomorrow, though, God had other plans.

Posted on by Abe Austin

Scriptural Analysis- Genesis 31:4-9

4 And Jacob sent and called Rachel and Leah to the field unto his flock,

5 And said unto them, I see your father’s countenance, that it is not toward me as before; but the God of my father hath been with me.

6 And ye know that with all my power I have served your father.

7 And your father hath deceived me, and changed my wages ten times; but God suffered him not to hurt me.

8 If he said thus, The speckled shall be thy wages; then all the cattle bare speckled: and if he said thus, The ringstraked shall be thy hire; then bare all the cattle ringstraked.

9 Thus God hath taken away the cattle of your father, and given them to me.

God had commanded Jacob to leave Laban and return to his former home. But while it appears Jacob was agreeable to that he also seems concerned for how his wives will take the news. They had lived their whole lives in this place, and he was about to ask them to give it all up.

Jacob began by testifying that they were cared for by God all this while, and not Laban. Which I imagine was meant to be a comfort to the women since God would still watch out for them, even when they were outside of their father’s protection.

And I very much appreciate this insight into how Jacob’s relationship with God has evolved. He had originally come to this land seeking mortal refuge, hoping that his uncle would provide for him in the place of his father. What he had instead found was that his uncle was untrustworthy, and repeatedly tried to cheat him, but God intervened in Jacob’s behalf. And through this God had won Jacob’s trust. Out on the fields God had assured Jacob that He would care for him, and now Jacob had seen the truth of it. Thus, Jacob took his sense of dependence from mankind and put it in the divine. And if the divine told him that it was time to leave, then he would trust that that was the right thing to do.