And Pharaoh heard of this matter, and sought to slay Moses. But Moses fled from before Pharaoh, and dwelt in the land of Midian. And he sat by the well.
One sentence carries Moses from the palace of Egypt to a stranger's well in the desert. It raises a hard question: what does it mean when a sincere attempt to help ends in flight?
The verse names Pharaoh as the danger, but the trouble started closer to home.
It does say that Moses fled from Pharaoh (v.15), but the context brings out something more: his own people had rejected him. Moses saw two Hebrew men quarrelling and corrected the one in the wrong. The man answered him: "Who made you a prince and a judge over us? Do you mean to kill me as you killed the Egyptian?" In fact, it was this opposition from his own people that put him in danger with Pharaoh.
Exodus tells us that Moses was afraid and ran. The New Testament looks at the same man and calls it faith.
Hebrews gives a most gracious view of what Moses did. This is how the Holy Spirit deals with the history of Old Testament saints. When He writes a man's history, He presents him as he is, and faithfully sets out all his failures and imperfections. But when He comments on that history in the New Testament, He gives only the real principle and main result of the man's life. So in Exodus we read that Moses "looked this way and that way," that "he was afraid and said, Surely the thing is known," and last of all that "Moses fled from Pharaoh." Yet Hebrews teaches that what he did, he did "by faith" — that he did not fear "the wrath of the king" — that "he endured as seeing him who is invisible."
Commentators differ over which departure Hebrews describes. Some tie it to this flight. Others tie it to the exodus out of Egypt.
Doubtless this refers to the second time that he left Egypt. On the first occasion, we read, "Moses fled from Pharaoh" (Ex. 2:15). On the second occasion he stood up to Pharaoh face to face. Under the mighty hand of God he brought the children of Israel out of Egypt in triumph.
Sitting by that well, Moses could have counted his whole life wasted. Commentators see the opposite.
What anguish for a faithful heart, blocked like this while sincerely trying to serve his own people! All his sacrifices and his surrender of the glories of Egypt may now have looked useless to others and of no profit to himself. He sat there, a wanderer and exile, like a withered, fruitless tree in the desert. But if these were Moses' thoughts, they were not God's. The mission was not forfeited, only postponed. God's time to deliver His people had not come, and the people themselves were not ready for that deliverance... And already, as he sits by the well in the land of Midian, he is under the discipline that will shape him. It is preparing him for the great service God has planned for him.
The forty years that follow do a specific work — not adding to Moses, but subtracting from him.
Moses needed forty years far out in the desert to fit him to lead God's people out of Egypt and through the wilderness. No doubt God used his education in Egypt to form the vessel for His service. But the forty years were needed to empty that vessel of all that had filled it during its making.
The flight looks like defeat. But God chose where Moses landed.
What could he do but leave Egypt altogether? He took a long journey to Midian, possibly nearly a hundred miles, which cut him off completely from his own people Israel as well as from Egypt. How intense his loneliness must have been! But it was God who had led him there. Sitting down to rest by a well, he saw a scene that again stirred his concern for the oppressed.
Commentators read the whole chapter as a prophecy in outline, with Midian standing for the Gentiles — the nations outside Israel.
Moses sees his own people oppressed and steps in to save them from their enemies, with temporary effect (Ex. 2:11-12). But when he goes further and tries to save them from themselves (Ex. 2:13-14), they reject him with scorn. So he withdraws into Midian among the Gentiles. There he finds others suffering injustice and oppression, and defends them. The earlier setbacks do not stop him. He opens to them the resources of the well, and wins Zipporah as his wife. Then he returns again to redeem Israel — and this time they receive him. All this is clearly a picture of the rejection of the Messiah by the Jews, and of His work since then among the Gentiles. There He receives the church as His bride... and afterwards He returns with her to save His Jewish people.
The same pattern appeared earlier with Joseph, but the two rejections are not identical:
In Joseph's case we have open hatred against his person. In Moses it is the rejection of his mission... Joseph was hated as a person; Moses was refused as a leader.
- Rejected. Pharaoh's sword was the visible threat. But his own people's refusal — "Who made you a prince and a judge over us?" — is what drove Moses out.
- Removed. Exodus records his fear; Hebrews records his faith. Scripture records the failure, then names the principle underneath it.
- Refined. The mission was postponed, not forfeited. Midian was not a gap in the story but the discipline that emptied the vessel Egypt had filled.
- Redirected. Alone and a hundred miles from his own people, Moses still defended strangers in Midian. Exile did not change his character.
- Returning. A deliverer refused by his own people takes a bride among outsiders, then comes back to redeem them. That is the shape of Christ's rejection, His church, and His return.
And the priest of Midian had seven daughters; and they came and drew [water], and filled the troughs, to water their father's flock.
Moses has run for his life from Egypt. The story pauses at a watering place in Midian, where seven young women arrive with their father's sheep. It looks like a small everyday scene. Yet it opens the forty years that turned a fallen prince into God's deliverer, and commentators see in it a picture of Christ Himself.
The flight behind this verse had two causes, not one. Pharaoh wanted him dead, but the deeper wound came from his own people.
It does say that Moses fled from Pharaoh (v.15). But the context brings out a further point: his own brothers had rejected him. When Moses saw two Hebrew men quarrelling, he reprimanded the guilty one. The answer came back: "Who made you ruler and judge over us? Do you intend to kill me, as you killed the Egyptian?" In fact, it was this opposition from his own people that put him in danger with Pharaoh.
The phrase "priest of Midian" belongs to an older order of things. Before the law, priesthood was not a fixed office held by one family. It was not limited to Abraham's line either.
Before the giving of the law, heads of families acted as priests. They served as need required or desire prompted, at the altars they built wherever they were staying in the land... Nor was this confined to the eldest male line of Abraham's descendants. Job acted in a similar way in his family, and Jethro, it would seem, filled that office among his people (Exodus 2:16). By the law, however, all this was changed for Israel... A regular order of priesthood was established, restricted to the family of Aaron.
Two verses later the text gives his name, and the name itself points to real knowledge of God.
He became an exile in Midian and met Reuel. His name is also Jethro (3:1). Reuel means "friend of God." He also was a priest, no doubt a true worshipper of God.
Commentators differ on how the family names fit together. One suggests Reuel may be the grandfather. In this view, "Hobab may have been the personal name, and Jethro an official name" (Morrish Bible Dictionary).
The daughters draw water and fill the troughs, and shepherds drive them off. Moses had just failed in public when he tried to help Israel. Here he refuses to sulk over his own losses.
He acts the part of a deliverer to the women at the well, who were driven away by the shepherds. He has been denied the chance to declare himself as such in a large circle. He does not refuse it in a very small one. He does not brood in dull sorrow over his own setbacks... Instead he submits to his circumstances, and rises above his own feelings, in his concern to serve others... Readiness to carry out our mission in the most hidden and unknown places, as well as the most attractive ones, is the strongest proof that it comes from God.
His unpaid kindness is what opens the door of a home to him.
At first Moses' service to those Midianite women meets with no reward... But it must not remain so. Reuel, their father, sends for him because of his service to his daughters, provides a home for him, and gives him his daughter Zipporah as his wife.
Where Moses happened to sit made him useful. One writer turns that into a rule for anyone who wants to serve.
We will never become a means of refreshing and blessing to others unless we drink, and drink daily and deeply, at the source ourselves. Every fresh testimony for Christ should be the result of fresh communion with Him... Like Moses in the land of Midian, sit down by the well — the well of living waters... Being close to the well, he was in a position to be helpful to the seven daughters of the priest of Midian and to his flock.
The sequence — refusal at home, service abroad, a bride, then a return — is read as a map of Christ's own path.
Moses sees his brothers oppressed. He steps in to save them from their enemies, and it works for a time (Ex. 2:11-12). But when he goes further and tries to save them from themselves (Ex. 2:13-14), they reject him with scorn. So he withdraws into Midian among the Gentiles. There he finds others suffering injustice and oppression, and he defends them. His earlier discouragements do not hold him back. He opens the resources of the well to them and wins Zipporah. Then he returns again to redeem Israel, and this time they receive him. All this pictures the rejection of the Messiah by the Jews. It also pictures His work since then among the Gentiles, where He receives the church as His bride.
- Rejection. Moses is at the well because his own people refused him, and that refusal is what exposed him to Pharaoh.
- Priest. "Priest of Midian" points back to a time when heads of families served at their own altars. Later the law limited the office to Aaron's family.
- Well. He sits at the source, and that is what puts him in a position to give water to others.
- Service. Denied a public role, he takes a hidden one — and readiness to serve in an unknown place is the proof of a real calling.
- Return. Rejected at home, he wins a bride abroad and comes back as a deliverer. That is the pattern of Christ: refused by Israel, receiving the church, and returning.
And the shepherds came and drove them away; but Moses rose and helped them, and watered their flock.
Moses arrives in Midian as a fugitive: his own people have refused him, Pharaoh hunts him, and nothing is left of his standing in Egypt. Why does a man whose life's mission has just collapsed still stand up for strangers at a well?
Moses had just failed and fled for his life. One writer asks what he must have felt as he sat there.
What a pile of distressing feelings must have weighed on this eager servant of God! What anguish for a faithful heart, pushed back like this when it sincerely tries to serve his brothers! All his sacrifices, all his giving up of Egypt's glory, may now have looked useless to others and worthless to himself. He sat there a wanderer and an exile, like a withered, fruitless tree in the desert. But if these were Moses' thoughts, they were not God's. The mission was not forfeited, only postponed. The vessel was not yet "ready for the Master's use."
He could have sat still and nursed his losses. Instead he stepped into someone else's trouble.
He acts the part of a deliverer to the women at the well who were driven away by the shepherds. Others denied him the right to show himself a deliverer in a large circle; he does not refuse that role in a very small one. He does not brood in dull sorrow over his own setbacks, like the fool eating his own flesh. Instead he accepts his circumstances and rises above his own feelings, because he wants to serve others... Nothing proves that our mission comes from God more than this: we carry it out just as readily in hidden, unknown places as in attractive, pleasant ones.
The verse holds two actions — driving the bullies back, and then drawing the water. One writer sees in that pair the same two traits Moses had already shown in Egypt.
Yet in spite of his rash act, Moses appears here in a two-fold character: deliverer and shepherd. The hand that struck the Egyptian was the hand of a deliverer. The heart of the shepherd shows in his concern to make peace between his quarrelling brothers. But his brothers refused him and Pharaoh hated him, so he flees to the land of Midian. There he shows other needy people that same hand of the deliverer and heart of the shepherd, stepping in for Reuel's daughters.
Another writer reads the scene simply as strength used on behalf of the weak. Seven women were no match for the shepherds; Moses made himself their advocate.
Sitting down to rest by a well, he saw a scene that stirred his concern once more for the oppressed. Seven daughters of one man, the priest of Midian, came to water their father's flock of sheep, but other shepherds came to drive them away. Moses took up the cause of the weak, helping the young women and watering their flock.
Where Moses sat mattered. Being near the water is what put him in a position to give it away.
Notice also, my soul: the fountain is not only the place of sweetest delight for yourself. It is also the place of the richest blessing for others. When we truly keep in touch with the source, we become a channel of living water to others... He was in the right position to help the daughters of Reuel water the flock.
Moses' exile put him among the Gentiles, the nations outside Israel. One writer reads the whole episode as a picture of something larger.
Moses sees his brothers oppressed and steps in to save them from their enemies, but the relief is temporary. When he goes on to try to save them from themselves, they reject him with scorn. So he withdraws into Midian among the Gentiles. There he finds other people suffering injustice and oppression, and he defends them. His earlier discouragements do not stop him. He opens the resources of the well to them, and he wins Zipporah as his wife. Then he returns to redeem Israel — and this time they receive him and obey. All of this clearly pictures the Messiah rejected by the Jews, and His work ever since among the Gentiles, where He receives the church as His bride and takes up relationships and responsibilities toward her family and her children. Afterwards He returns with her to save His Jewish people.
His courage at the well opened a door — a home with Jethro — but not yet the mission.
Jethro sent for the Egyptian who had helped his daughters so boldly, and in his house Moses found a home. In Midian, as we have said, he learned deep lessons. One was to distrust his own right arm, and to learn from God's own teaching, at the end of forty years there, who Jehovah was.
- Refused — The people he tried to save had turned him away. God did not cancel his calling; He only postponed it while shaping the man for it.
- Rose — He did not brood over his losses. He stood up and served, and such readiness in a hidden corner is what proves where a mission comes from.
- Rescued — Two things show at once: the deliverer's hand that drove the shepherds off, and the shepherd's heart that watered the flock.
- Reached — Seated by the water, he became a channel of it to others; nearness to the source is what makes anyone useful.
- Returns — His own people turned him away, so he blessed strangers and won a bride among them. Then he went back to deliver Israel, and this time they received him.
And when they came to Reuel their father, he said, Why are ye come so soon to-day?
Moses has fled from Egypt to Midian, sat down by a well, and defended seven sisters whom the shepherds drove off. Their father's surprise at how early they come home is the first notice anyone takes of a rejected man's quiet service.
The father named here goes by more than one name in the Bible, and commentators differ on how to fit them together. One reference work sets out the problem and the likely answer.
He seems to be called REUEL in Exodus 2:18, and HOBAB in Numbers 10:29, where RAGUEL is REUEL in the Hebrew. That passage says Raguel the Midianite was the father of HOBAB, the father-in-law of Moses (see also Judges 4:11). So in Exodus 2:18 "father" may mean "grandfather." Hobab may have been the personal name, and Jethro an official name.
One writer fills in who this man was, and what Moses gained by marrying into his house — a wife from outside Israel.
He became an exile in Midian and met Reuel. His name also is Jethro (3:1). Reuel means "friend of God." He also was a priest, no doubt a true worshipper of God. Moses received a daughter of the Midianite, Zipporah, for his wife. Rejected by his own people, he entered into union with a Gentile.
Moses says nothing about himself. The clock gives him away: the daughters are home early, and that starts the conversation.
Moses stepped in, and helped the young women so well that they came home early enough to make their father ask how it had happened. He sent word that the stranger should share his hospitality. The gift of his daughter as a wife followed.
Moses had wanted to deliver a nation, and his people refused him. At the well the job was tiny, and the way he took it shaped his exile.
He acts the part of a deliverer to the women at the well, who had been driven away by the shepherds. He has been denied the chance to declare himself a deliverer in a large circle, but he does not refuse to be one in a very small circle. He does not brood in listless sorrow over his own losses, like the fool who eats his own flesh. He submits to his circumstances, and rises above his own feelings, in his concern to serve others.
What he did for the sisters was not a new role for him.
The hand that struck the Egyptian was the hand of a deliverer. The heart of the shepherd shows in his concern to make peace between his own people when they were quarrelling. But his own people refused him, and Pharaoh hated him, so he flees to the land of Midian. There he shows other people in need the same hand of the deliverer and heart of the shepherd, when he steps in for Reuel's daughters.
One writer treats the well where Moses sat down as the reason he had anything to give.
But notice here too, my soul, that the fountain is not only the place of sweetest delight to yourself, but of the richest blessing to others. When we are truly connected with the source, we become the channel of living water to others. We are told that when Moses fled from Pharaoh to the land of Midian, "he sat down by a well." What a beautiful picture of the Christian's privileged place! He was now in the right position to help the daughters of Reuel water the flock.
One writer traces the whole sequence, and finds in it far more than one man's story.
Moses, seeing his own people oppressed, steps in to save them from their enemies, and it works for a while. But when he goes on to try to save them from themselves, they reject him with scorn. So he withdraws into Midian among the Gentiles. There he finds other people suffering injustice and oppression, and defends them, undaunted by his earlier discouragements. He opens the resources of the well to them, courts and marries Zipporah, and then returns again to redeem Israel. This time they receive him and submit to him. All this is obviously a picture of the rejection of the Messiah by the Jews, and of His work since then among the Gentiles, where He receives the church as His bride, returning afterwards with her to save His Jewish people.
The father's question ends in a home, and the home in a long education.
We are not surprised, then, that Jethro sent for the Egyptian who had helped his daughters so bravely. And in his house Moses found a home. In Midian, as we have said, he learned deep lessons. One was to distrust his own strength, and to learn by God's teaching, at the end of forty years there, who Jehovah was.
- Rejected. His own people refused him and Pharaoh hated him, so Moses came to Midian as an exile.
- Positioned. He sits by a well — near the source, and so able to become a channel of blessing to others.
- Noticed. He serves in a circle so small it seems to count for nothing, and the only witness is a father wondering why his daughters are home early.
- Received. The question leads to a summons, a meal, a home, and a wife — welcome among strangers after refusal among his own.
- Prepared. Forty years in that home teach him to distrust his own strength, so the deliverer his people once refused can come back and be received.
And they said, An Egyptian delivered us out of the hand of the shepherds, and also drew [water] abundantly for us, and watered the flock.
Moses has fled Egypt because his own people refused him. Now he sits by a well in a foreign land, rescues seven strangers from bullying shepherds, and the young women go home and call their rescuer an Egyptian.
Their report answers their father's surprise that they came home early. A small act of help set the whole chain moving:
As he sat by the well, the seven daughters of Reuel came with their father's flock. But the shepherds drove them away from the troughs they were trying to fill to water the sheep. Moses stepped in and helped the young women. So they came back early enough to prompt their father's question about how it happened. Their father sent a message inviting the stranger to accept his hospitality.
The women report two things: he rescued them, and he drew water for them. Both acts mark him as deliverer and shepherd at once.
His brothers refused him, and Pharaoh hated him. So he flees to the land of Midian. There he shows other needy people the hand of the deliverer and the heart of the shepherd, stepping in on behalf of Reuel's daughters.
The watering was not a detour from his calling. It was training for it:
Moses had become a shepherd, just as David later was a shepherd before becoming king of Israel. If Moses was to be a true deliverer, he had to learn a heart of kindness toward the weak and dependent. Then he would treat Israel with a shepherd's care rather than a ruler's authority.
A foreign household takes in the man his own nation refused.
They refused to believe and rejected this deliverer. So the children of Israel are left a while longer at the Egyptian brick-kilns. But the one they pushed away is welcomed somewhere else. He is set at the head not of a nation but of a family, and enjoys closer and sweeter friendships than he had ever known among his own relatives. A stranger receives him. Jethro, the Midianite, opens his house to him and gives him his daughter in marriage, because he had been her deliverer. Israel had just refused him, despite the same grace shown to them.
Commentators read Moses' exile as more than history. They see in it where the Lord stands today.
The flight of Moses into the land of Midian is a marked picture of our Lord's present position toward Israel and the world. Rejected by His own, He has withdrawn. During this present time, when Israel does not know Him, He has, like Moses, found a bride among the Gentiles… But, like Moses, our Lord will return to deliver His earthly people, as Moses returned from the land of Midian and led Israel out.
The rescue at the well is tiny compared to the exodus. That is where its value lies. A man shows what he is by how he serves when almost nobody is watching.
He acts the part of a deliverer to the women at the well, who were driven away by the shepherds. He has been denied the chance to show himself as such in a large circle. Yet he does not refuse it in a very small one. He does not brood in listless sorrow over his own setbacks… Instead, he submits to his circumstances and rises above his own feelings in his interest to serve others… Nothing proves the divine origin of our mission more than the ease and readiness with which we serve in the most hidden and unknown places, as well as in the most attractive ones.
He could draw water for them because of where he had sat down.
Note also, my soul, that the fountain is not only the place of sweetest delight to yourself, but of the richest blessing to others. When we are truly connected with the source, we become the channel of living water to others… He was in the right position to help the daughters of Reuel water the flock.
- Rejected. His own people pushed him away; that refusal, not just Pharaoh's anger, is what drove him to Midian.
- Received. Strangers took in the man Israel would not have, and gave him a home and a wife because he had been their deliverer.
- Renamed. They call him "an Egyptian." Strangers name the rescuer by a foreign label while his own nation still does not know him.
- Rehearsed. Rescuing seven women and watering a flock trained the shepherd's heart that would later lead a nation. Small service proved the man.
- Returning. Commentators see a picture of Christ here: rejected by Israel, gathering a bride among the nations, certain to come back for His earthly people.
And he said to his daughters, And where is he? why then have ye left the man behind? Call him, that he may eat bread.
Moses has fled Egypt as a wanted man. At a well in Midian he defends seven sisters from bullying shepherds. Their father does not send thanks from a distance. He rebukes his daughters and tells them to bring the man home for a meal. That meal shapes the next forty years of Moses' life.
The daughters had accepted the help and walked away. Their father saw a debt still standing, and he moved to settle it.
At first Moses' service to those Midianite women meets no repayment, just as Joseph's service to the chief butler did. But it must not stay that way. Reuel, their father, sends for him because of his service to his daughters, provides a home for him, and gives him his daughter Zipporah as his wife.
Moses had tried to deliver a whole nation, and his own people turned him away. At the well the circle was tiny, but he served there anyway.
Whether Moses' forty years of exile are one unbroken season of sorrow and gloom, or whether comfort and cheer soften them, depends on how the disciplined man receives the discipline. The moment he submits, the discipline becomes effective and may be relaxed. It is not removed, but the scene may be brightened. And so it was with Moses. He acts the part of a deliverer to the women at the well, who were driven away by the shepherds. Although he has been denied the chance to show himself as such in a large circle, he does not refuse it in a very small one. He does not sit in sorrow over his own losses, like the fool who eats his own flesh. Instead he submits to his circumstances and rises above his own feelings in his concern to serve others.
The contrast in the chapter is sharp. His own people pushed him away. A foreign household now sets a place for him at its table.
The one whom they pushed away is accepted in another place. He is seated, not at the head of a nation, but of a family. There he enjoys closeness and affection sweeter and nearer than he had ever known among his own relatives. A stranger receives him. Jethro the Midianite opens his house to him and gives him his daughter in marriage, because he had been her deliverer. Israel had just refused him, despite the same grace shown to them.
The man who gives the order has two names in Scripture. The meaning of the first one points to who he was.
He became an exile in Midian and met Reuel. His name is also Jethro (3:1). Reuel means "friend of God." He was also a priest, no doubt a true worshipper of God. Moses received Zipporah, a daughter of the Midianite, as his wife. Rejected by his own people, he entered into union with a Gentile. All this is typical. Christ came the first time and was rejected by His own. He receives her who shares His rejection, and she will come with Him when He comes the second time. The church is indicated here.
The call to eat bread opened a door into a house. That house schooled Moses for forty years.
We are not surprised, then, that Jethro sent for the Egyptian who had so bravely helped his daughters. And in his house Moses found a home. In Midian, as we have said, he learned deep lessons. One of them was to distrust his own right arm, and to learn from God's own teaching, at the end of forty years living there, who Jehovah was.
Behind the father's hospitality, another hand is at work.
We see God acting in His providence and giving Moses a home and a wife in a strange land.
A place at the table did not settle Moses' heart. The name he later gave his son shows what the welcome could not remove.
This name reveals to us the secret sorrow of Moses. Though provided with a home, he still felt himself a stranger in a strange land. So his son, who tied him to the scene, had to carry a name that kept his exiled condition before him. No present mercies could shut that condition out.
- Serve — Moses had lost his large mission, yet he still helped seven strangers at a well. The invitation to eat bread came out of that small act.
- Sent for — the father would not let the kindness go unpaid. He sent for Moses, gave him a home, and gave him Zipporah as his wife.
- Received — his own people pushed him away. A foreign household took him in, and there he found closeness he had never known among his relatives.
- Schooled — that home became forty years of training. There Moses learned to distrust his own strength and learned from God who Jehovah is.
- Stranger still — the name he gave his son shows that a table and a family never cured his sense of exile. Commentators also read the whole scene as a picture of the rejected Christ receiving a bride from outside Israel.
And Moses consented to remain with the man; and he gave Moses Zipporah his daughter.
Moses has fled Egypt, rejected by the people he tried to help, and he now sits by a well in Midian. Here that flight turns into a home and a marriage, and commentators find in it both God's care for a broken servant and a picture of something larger.
The plainest reading is that God, unseen and unmentioned in the verse, arranged all of it.
Exodus 2 compresses the next forty years of Moses' life into verses 15-22. Again we see God acting in His providence, giving Moses a home and a wife in a strange land.
Moses had wanted to rescue a nation. Instead he helped a few shepherd girls at a well — and that small act is what opened a home to him.
He acts the part of a deliverer to the women at the well, who were driven away by the shepherds. He could not declare himself a deliverer in a large circle, but he does not refuse to be one in a very small circle. He does not brood in sorrow over his own setbacks. He accepts his circumstances and rises above his own feelings, out of concern to serve others. Nothing proves better that our mission comes from God than the ease and readiness with which we carry it out. We serve in the most hidden and unknown places as readily as in the most attractive ones. Reuel, the father of these women, sends for Moses because of his service to his daughters. He gives him a home, and gives him his daughter Zipporah as his wife.
Commentators treat Moses as a picture of Christ. This is not a private idea: Scripture itself says a prophet like Moses was coming.
The Lord your God will raise up for you a prophet like me from among you, from your brothers — it is to him you shall listen. (Deuteronomy 18:15) So we are not inventing something when we see Moses as a picture of Christ. This is the plain teaching of Scripture. In the closing verses of Exodus 2 we see this type in two ways: first, Israel rejects him; second, he joins himself to a stranger in the land of Midian. In Joseph's case we have open hatred of his person. In Moses it is the rejection of his mission. Of Joseph we read that they hated him and could not speak peacefully to him. Of Moses the words are, "Who made you a prince and a judge over us?" In short, people hated Joseph as a person; they refused Moses as a leader.
The picture is real, but commentators are careful about how much weight it will bear.
Zipporah is one of the least known pictures of the church in the Old Testament. Some details of her life fit such a reading, but they are few, and perhaps less obvious than with Eve or Asenath. J. N. Darby said of her: "In her we see a faint type of the church."
Joseph also married a foreign wife, Asenath, but his situation was the opposite of Moses'.
Asenath shows quite a different side of the church from the one we see in Zipporah. Asenath joined Joseph in the time of his exaltation. Zipporah was the companion of Moses in the obscurity of his desert life. True, the brothers of both Joseph and Moses rejected them when they married a stranger. Yet Joseph was "governor over all the land of Egypt," while Moses tended a few sheep at the back of the desert.
Moses was content to stay. He had already had one education; the one that mattered began here.
The forty years spent by Moses in Midian were, as we say, the best years of his life. He had forty years' training in Egypt. Then the Lord took him aside into His own school, to train him for the great work He had chosen him to do. In the obscurity of the desert He prepared him to be "a vessel fit for the Master's use." How blessed his experience must have been — away from man, away from Egypt's pleasures, alone with God. The Lord has dealt this way with all His servants.
- Rejected. Moses' own people refused his mission. His exile in Midian begins with a door closed at home.
- Serving. He would not sulk over a lost calling. He acted as a rescuer at a well for a few strangers, and that hidden service is what won him a home.
- Given. God's providence, not Moses' planning, gave him a home and a wife in a foreign land.
- Faint but real. A rejected deliverer takes a foreign bride. Commentators see here a picture of Christ receiving the church while Israel refuses Him — a faint likeness, they say, not a full one.
- Trained. Zipporah joined Moses in the desert, not on a throne. His willingness to settle there turned forty hidden years into God's school for the man who would lead a nation out.