And Moses tended the flock of Jethro his father-in-law, the priest of Midian. And he led the flock behind the wilderness, and came to the mountain of God -- to Horeb.
Moses grew up in Egypt's royal court; forty years later he is minding another man's sheep in the desert. Why does God move a gifted man out of sight before He uses him?
One commentator sets Moses' two worlds side by side.
Here we see an amazing change of circumstances. In Genesis 46:31 we read that "every shepherd is an abomination to the Egyptians." Yet God takes Moses, who had learned all the wisdom of the Egyptians, from the Egyptian court to the back of a mountain, to mind a flock of sheep and to be trained for God's service… To find such a man, with such gifts, called away from such a position to mind sheep at the back of a mountain, is far beyond what human thought or feeling can reach.
Those years in Midian were not wasted. They were a training course with two subjects.
Forty is the number of testing. You see it in Israel's forty years in the wilderness, and in the forty days of our blessed Lord's temptation. So this was a time of testing. It tested what Moses was, and it gave him time to prove what God was. We must always learn both before we are fit for service. So God always sends His servants into the wilderness before He uses them… There, alone with Him, we discover how empty our own resources are, and how completely we depend on Him.
Egypt trained Moses well, but something was still missing.
If any educated man in his natural state could expect success in God's service, Moses could have counted on it. He was grown up, he was learned, he was mighty in word and deed. Yet at the back of the desert he had to learn something Egypt's schools could never have taught him. Paul learned more in Arabia than he ever learned at the feet of his teacher Gamaliel. No one can teach like God, and everyone who will learn from Him must be alone with Him.
The job itself was part of the shaping, and it points beyond Moses.
Moses had become a shepherd, the job the Egyptians despised (Gen. 46:34). It was part of God's training, and through it he became "very meek, more than all people who were on the face of the earth" (Num. 12:3). As a shepherd he is a picture of Christ.
The place matters. God met him at the very spot the story would come back to.
At the end of the 40 years in Midian, Moses had led Jethro's flock close to Horeb. Horeb seems to be the wider name for a group of mountains, and Sinai was its chief peak. God appeared to him at that spot. So he received his commission at the very place where he would bring the people after he led them out of Egypt, and where God would give the law that is for ever linked with his name.
One commentator notes that the name itself looks ahead.
The scene is at Horeb, called the mountain of God here, a name given ahead of time.
Moses was doing his ordinary job that day. That routine is where God's call reached him.
In the ordinary run of his work, he leads the flock to the far side of the desert and comes to Horeb, the mountain of God. No doubt he had no idea that his years of exile were about to end… Then something catches Moses' attention. His everyday duties did not stop him recognising the Lord when He showed Himself. They never need to… One of the greatest proofs that a man is subject to God is this: he does his daily work with care and patience, and still keeps his eye ready to watch the ways of God.
Moses had once tried to act on his own. Here is where his real authority came from.
Horeb is the starting post for everyone God sends out to act for Him… Forty years earlier he had gone to work, but he moved too soon… Here was real authority. There is a huge difference between God sending a man and a man running unsent.
- Court — Egypt gave Moses learning and status. None of it could fit him for God's service.
- Desert — Forty years alone tested what Moses was and showed him what God is. Nowhere else do we learn to depend on Him.
- Flock — The Egyptians despised shepherds. That despised work made Moses the meekest of men, and in it he pictures Christ.
- Mountain — God called him at Horeb, and to Horeb he would bring the people he led out.
- Commission — Moses did his daily work with his eye open to God. Then God sent him. Being sent is what separates real service from running unsent.
And the Angel of Jehovah appeared to him in a flame of fire out of the midst of a thorn-bush and he looked, and behold, the thorn-bush burned with fire, and the thorn-bush was not being consumed.
Moses turned aside to look at a thorn bush that was burning but would not burn up. The sight raises the question the chapter answers. How can God, who is a consuming fire, come near a people without destroying them?
God could have stopped Moses in a hundred ways. He chose this one on purpose.
We are never to suppose that the manner of the revelation of God is an unimportant consideration. He is sovereign, no doubt. But for that very reason His sovereignty is wise. He always shows Himself in the way that best fits the purpose in hand. So it was in no casual way, or merely to catch attention by wonders, that Jehovah here appears in the burning bush. The bush is weak and ready to vanish away, yet it remains. Where God reveals Himself in pity as well as in power, He sustains the one He is dealing with. Whatever the siftings and judgments, whatever the trials, He uses them for nothing but good. It is for His own glory, and so for the very best interests of those who are His.
One writer takes the scene apart piece by piece.
There are three parts to the vision granted here — the Lord, the flame of fire, and the bush. Notice first that it says the angel of the Lord appeared to Moses (v. 2). Then the Lord saw that he turned aside, and God called to him from inside the bush... So the angel of the Lord is identified with Jehovah, yes, with God Himself. In all these appearances of the angel of the Lord in the Old Testament, we see, pictured in advance, the coming of the Son of God in human flesh. In each case it is God the Son... The flame of fire is a symbol of the holiness of God... The bush was meant to be a figure of Israel. Nothing is more easily consumed by fire than a bush, and it was chosen for this very reason to represent the nation.
The word used is not for a fine tree.
In both the Old and New Testaments, the word used means a bush of thorns, or bramble bush. It is a bush of little worth, and fire would soon burn it up. But God was in the bush, and therefore it was not consumed.
Thorns are not a neutral detail. They trace back to the first pages of the Bible, where the ground was cursed after man's sin.
You remember that thorns were the sign of the curse at the beginning. Botanists tell us that thorns (at least the kind we are dealing with here) are really stunted leaves. They are parts of a plant that cannot do what they were first meant to do. Sinners are in this symbol naturally connected with the curse upon sin. And we can view the thorn-bush itself, without forcing the picture, as the type of sinful flesh. This is what the people are, and so the fire comes. But the bush is not consumed, because the Angel of Jehovah, their covenant God, is in that fire.
The fire means more than holiness. Israel was already in a furnace.
The fire is the symbol of their suffering and tribulation... Later God called Egypt the "iron furnace" (Deut. 4:20). The thornbush, however, is not consumed. All the fires of persecution and tribulation could not consume Israel.
Who was in the bush? One writer answers, and points to a later furnace.
But the Son of God was in the bush. That was the secret. He was with Israel in Egypt, just as He was later in the furnace with Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego. The bush burned, and the furnace was heated seven times hotter than usual. Yet the smell of fire did not settle on them.
The wonder is not that fire burns, but that this bush lived. Another writer sees in it God living among a redeemed people.
What a fitting, solemn, and beautiful picture of Jehovah living among His chosen and redeemed people! "Our God is a consuming fire" — not to consume us, but to consume everything in us and around us that is against His holiness. Such things destroy our true and lasting happiness.
The bush points forward. One writer sees its full answer in a manger, quoting an older translation of 1 Timothy 3:16.
The Baby in Bethlehem's manger was the great fulfilment of the burning bush. "God was manifest in the flesh and seen of angels." God was in the midst of men and they were not consumed.
- Bush. A worthless bramble, thorny from the curse on sin. It pictures a people that fire could burn up in a moment.
- Fire. Two things at once: Israel's affliction in Egypt, and the holiness of a God who is a consuming fire.
- Angel. The one in the flame is identified with Jehovah Himself; the bush survived only because God was inside it.
- Purpose. He consumes what is contrary to His holiness, not the people He has redeemed for Himself.
- Fulfilment. The unburnt bush finds its answer at Bethlehem — God in the midst of men, and men not consumed.
And Moses said, Let me now turn aside and see this great sight, why the thorn-bush is not burnt.
Moses is far from Egypt, keeping another man's sheep, when a bush on fire refuses to burn up. He steps off his path to ask why. That turn makes an ordinary day the moment God speaks his name.
Fire consumes what it touches. Moses watched that law fail in front of him. The lesson went far beyond one bush.
Here was a sight that directly contradicted everything natural, and Moses was drawn to it. He had to learn that although "our God is a consuming fire" (Heb. 12:29), He could live among a people who in themselves were thorny and fit fuel for the flames, and yet not consume them. It was indeed a "great sight." For forty years in the wilderness the LORD dwelt as a pillar of fire among rebellious Israel. In those years Moses must have thought back on the way God had revealed Himself to him at the start, in His great kindness.
The bush is a thorn bush; some translations read "thorn-bush" here. Each part of the picture means something, and the reason the bush survives is not in the bush.
The burning bush is a picture of the suffering people, the wretched slaves in Egypt. It was a thornbush. Thorns are the result of sin, so the bush pictures the sinfulness and worthlessness of the people. The fire is the symbol of their suffering and tribulation… The thornbush, however, is not consumed. All the fires of persecution and tribulation could not consume Israel. In the flame of the fire in the midst of the burning bush the angel of the LORD appeared. This was the secret of the bush's preservation; God was there and kept them.
Moses wanted to know why the bush was not burnt. Turn that into a question about God and man, and it becomes the largest question there is.
Let us repeat this expression of wonder — "Why is the bush not burned!" Put it another way. God is a "consuming fire," burning up all that is contrary to His Holy Being. How then can He reveal Himself without consuming? Here was the great question. Can He "who is of purer eyes than to behold iniquity" deal with man in any way except by judgment in righteousness? Yes; most surely He can, and He has done so. He has revealed Himself in Christ! And grace now reigns, through righteousness, to eternal life by Jesus Christ our Lord! That is the gospel.
Note the order: Moses turns, then God calls. His stopping was not a delay before the real event. It marked him out.
Moses turns aside to see why the bush is not consumed. "And when the LORD saw that he turned aside," God called him, to reveal Himself as the God of holiness, who was like a consuming fire. Yet in grace He could take up such a people as Israel — a frail, useless bush of the desert. He would not destroy them, but purify them and glorify them with His own presence. This is the whole central plan and idea of redemption. What shows Moses to be a seer is that he turns aside to study it, instead of passing by in indifference. "When the LORD saw that," He called him to the prophetic office.
Walking on would have cost Moses the blessing. He stayed and listened, and found out who was in the bush.
It was a great and mysterious sight that Moses turned aside to look at; yet barefoot he could still look and listen. Had he not done so, he would have gone away unblessed. But he listened, until he discovered that the "I AM" was in the bush; and further, that "the God of Abraham" was there too. A strange place for such glory to house itself! But so it was. In a burning bramble bush, the Lord God Almighty was found.
God was about to send Moses out on a commission. The place He chose to speak from was itself part of the message.
He was about to give Moses his commission to lead His people out of Egypt. They were to be His assembly — His dwelling-place, in the wilderness and in the land of Canaan. And the place from which He speaks is a burning bush. What a fitting, solemn and beautiful symbol of the LORD dwelling among His chosen and redeemed people! "Our God is a consuming fire," not to consume us, but to consume everything in us and around us that is contrary to His holiness.
- Great — fire that burns and does not destroy. The sight broke the rule of nature, and Moses stopped.
- Thorny — the bush was a worthless desert bramble. It pictured slaves in Egypt with nothing in themselves to survive the fire.
- Why — Moses' question is the gospel question: how can a holy God come near to man and not consume him? The answer is Christ.
- Turning — God called only after He saw Moses turn aside. Stopping to look at God is what fits a person for His service.
- Dwelling — the God who spared the bush lives among His people. He consumes not them, but what is contrary to His holiness.
And Jehovah saw that he turned aside to see, and God called to him out of the midst of the thorn-bush and said, Moses, Moses! And he said, Here am I.
For forty years Moses kept sheep in the desert. Then a bush burned without burning up, he stepped aside to look, and God spoke his name out of the flame.
God's call comes the moment Moses stops to look. One writer sees a pattern in that:
Then one ordinary day the extraordinary thing happens, and he turns aside to see the "common bush aflame with God." "When the LORD saw that he turned aside to see, God called to him." To a definite call and commission He adds the gracious confirmation, "Certainly I will be with you." But first He had to gain his attention. How often this same pattern has repeated. God waits to use and bless us, as soon as He can gain our interest in what He is doing, is about to do, or is willing to do through us.
The waiting had a purpose. Egypt taught him, and the desert had to unteach him.
The moment Moses had so long desired came. His long training in the wisdom of the Egyptians did not bring it. An equal stretch in the desert, spent unlearning, had to run out first. Only then did God give him the effective call.
Verse 2 says the angel of the LORD appeared; verse 4 says God called. That difference matters.
Notice first that the angel of the Lord appeared to Moses (v. 2). Then the Lord saw that he turned aside, and God called to him out of the bush. So the angel of the Lord is identified with Jehovah — yes, with God Himself. There is no doubt that in all these Old Testament appearances of the angel of the Lord we see the coming incarnation of the Son of God foreshadowed.
God calls the name, and says it twice. That doubling runs right through Scripture:
God's greatness and majesty produced a striking response when He spoke in grace to saints of old. When He called, "Abraham, Abraham," at once the answer came, "Here I am." When He said, "Jacob, Jacob," the reply came at once: "Here I am." To Moses He spoke, "Moses, Moses!" and Moses answered at once: "Here I am." … The same One speaks as before, in the same way, but now come down in lowly grace: "Martha, Martha!" and "Simon, Simon!" Once again, after His ascension, "Saul, Saul!"
The place God chose to speak from carries the message.
The Lord was about to give Moses his commission to lead His people out of Egypt. They were to be His assembly — His dwelling place, in the wilderness and in the land of Canaan. And the place from which He speaks is a burning bush. What a fitting, solemn, and beautiful picture of the Lord living among His chosen and redeemed people! "Our God is a consuming fire." He does not consume us. He consumes everything in us and about us that is contrary to His holiness.
The voice answered the question the sight had raised.
Moses could now know why the bush was not consumed: God was in the midst of the flame. God was in and with Israel in their furnace of affliction; He was in their midst sustaining and keeping them.
The first words after the name are not the commission but a warning about the ground. Being called near is not the same as being casual.
His presence is the true power of sanctification. Forms He could and did use under the law, in tabernacle and temple. But He Himself is more than any or all of them. What a support this was for Moses! He had to go in to Pharaoh, lead His people out, and bear with their waywardness in the wilderness.
This is not an isolated episode but part of a series of divine calls running through Scripture:
In the garden, out of heaven, and for a third time out of the bush, God's call is heard. This time He calls not as the truth that exposes sin, nor as the love that provides a substitute, but as the Holy One who redeems His people. He takes His place among them without lessening His glory, and He makes them able to bear it. The call implies that man had wandered from God, as Adam had. It comes from the heart of God, and it invites us into His own heavenly presence, as it did Abraham.
- Attention. God waited until Moses turned aside; the call came the moment He had the man's interest.
- Voice. The One who called is the angel of the LORD, identified with God Himself. Writers see the coming incarnation of the Son foreshadowed here.
- Name. He calls "Moses, Moses" — as He did with Abraham, Jacob, Martha, Simon and Saul. The doubled name draws out the reply, "Here I am."
- Fire. God speaks from inside the flame, and that is why the bush survives. A consuming fire dwells among His people without destroying them.
- Presence. His presence itself, not any form or ritual, is what sanctifies. That presence is what sustained Moses before Pharaoh.
And he said, Draw not nigh hither loose thy sandals from off thy feet, for the place whereon thou standest is holy ground.
Moses turns aside to look at a bush that burns without burning up. God's first words to him are not about Egypt or Israel. They are about the ground under his feet. Before the commission comes the check: the man God is about to send must first learn what God is.
God calls Moses by name, then stops him. One writer reads this halt as the first lesson of every relationship with God, and the condition for hearing anything from Him.
God must remind him of the holiness of the divine presence. "Do not come near; take your sandals off your feet, for the place on which you are standing is holy ground." This is the first lesson that all who approach God must learn: to recognize His holiness. True, He is a God of grace and mercy, and He is love; but He is all these because He is a holy God... But we must take our shoes off, remembering the holiness of the God we deal with. Otherwise we can never receive the gracious communications of His mind and will.
Nothing about that patch of desert made it different from the sand around it. The holiness came from who was there. The same holds for any place God chooses to dwell.
The place of God's presence is holy, and can only be trodden with unshod feet. God dwells among His people. That gives their assembly a character of holiness, and it is the basis of every holy affection and every holy activity. The character of the dwelling place takes its stamp from the character of the Occupant.
The presence that demands holiness also supplies it.
His presence is the true power of sanctification. Forms He could and did use under the law, in tabernacle and temple. But He Himself is more than any or all.
The command targets the feet, and sandals had a job to do.
Shoes are to protect the feet from injury and defilement. The feet are our point of contact with the earth. How important that shoes guard them from its thorns and its soil! In the presence of God the shoes came off, for the ground was holy. Earth must not defile in that holy Presence.
Bare feet also said something about the man himself. One writer reads the removal as an admission:
Moses' shoes must be removed as a confession of his own dependent weakness before God.
The order to stop marks a boundary. One writer sets it beside a later scene, where a father puts shoes on the feet of the son who comes home.
It showed that as yet there was no welcome for man into the presence of God. God had not yet made a standing for him, however much goodness and kindness He might show him. Under grace a standing is found. The son who came home received shoes; he was welcome and at home.
The two commands are not in conflict; they belong to two different footings before God.
"Put shoes on his feet," too. The law said, "Take off the sandal." Grace says, "Put shoes on" — that is, "I will provide him with fitness to tread those courts above." The law says, "Take your shoes off, you are not fit." Grace says, "I will make you fit."
Yet the boundary did not send Moses away.
Long ago, anyone entering that presence had to take the shoes off his feet, to express the sense of holiness that suited it. But that was all. God did not require Moses or Joshua to withdraw; only to tread softly. They were welcomed and encouraged, while being taught the holiness of such closeness.
The holiness of the spot is tied to the sight in front of Moses. Commentators read the bush as Israel under Egypt's fire, and then look further:
But the fact of this being holy ground points to a much deeper lesson than this, for it is a reminder of the cross of Christ, where all the awesome fire of God's judgment fell upon the Lord Jesus because of our sins. But that fire did not consume Him.
- Holiness first. God tells Moses where he stands before He says a word about Egypt. Holiness is the first lesson.
- The Occupant, not the location. Desert sand becomes holy ground because God is there. A dwelling takes its character from the One who fills it.
- Bare feet. Shoes carry the soil of the road. Taking them off confesses the earth's defilement and the servant's own weakness.
- Stopped but not sent away. "Do not come near" set a limit, but God did not send Moses away. He told him to tread softly.
- Shoes given back. What law removed, grace supplies. The fire of judgment fell on Christ and did not consume Him, so the son comes home and receives shoes.
And he said, I am the God of thy father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob. And Moses hid his face; for he was afraid to look at God.
At the burning bush God names Himself to Moses by three men long dead. Moses covers his face. Why that name, at that moment? And why did the sight of God frighten him?
God did not name Himself from Sinai and the law. He named Himself from the promises made to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. That choice shaped how near Moses could come.
Moses had to keep at a distance and remove his shoes, as a sign that the place was holy, and he was only a servant. There had to be distance. But it was far less marked than later, when God gave the law. This was doubtless because at the outset the Lord revealed Himself to him as "the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob." The God who set up the covenant of promise was not so awesome as when He gave the law from Sinai.
The name itself was old. What was new was that God was now about to act on it.
The name He gave Himself was not new — people had heard it before. But now He was about to act on its reality and present value. There was to be accomplishment up to a certain and evident point, and not promise only. So the stress falls on "the God of your fathers," explained as "the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob."
Before the three great names comes a smaller one: "the God of your father." That phrase reached Moses himself.
The words that Moses heard out of the middle of the fire in the bush must have awakened in his heart the memory of God's goodness towards the fathers. But they must also have shown him that he had a personal link with the God of Abraham. For God had said to him, "I am the God of your father."
The same meeting shows two things at once: grace and holiness.
If God's holiness is infinite, His grace is infinite also. The way He revealed Himself to Moses declared His holiness. The very fact that He revealed Himself at all showed His grace. He came down because He was gracious. But having come down, He would reveal Himself as holy… God's presence must always make nature hide itself. When we stand before God with bare feet and covered head — the attitude of soul which those acts so aptly and beautifully express — we are ready to listen to the sweet words of grace. When man takes his proper place, God can speak in the language of unmixed mercy.
Moses' fear marks where he stood — before the exodus, before God had redeemed His people.
Before redemption, even a saint trembled when brought into God's presence. His voice does declare Him the God of promise, the God of the fathers Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. Even so, "Moses trembled, and did not dare to look." Until redemption, peace is impossible.
Jesus used this sentence to prove that the dead live. His argument turns on what it would mean for God to name Himself after men who no longer exist.
If Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob had ceased to exist, could God still have taken their names, the names of nothing, to describe Himself to Israel? … God describes Himself by them. He is not ashamed to be called their God… He is not the God of the dead, but of the living. But this truth went further. Abraham was dead, his soul separated from his body. He was living for God, yet he was not what God meant him to be as his God… He was to be complete, and so raised from the dead.
Everything turns on one small word — the tense of the verb.
Our Lord stresses His point in that God said, "I AM." The strength of His argument lies in the present tense of the verb "to be." So exact is verbal inspiration.
Moses could not look. Believers now can. The difference is how God has since made Himself known.
This is a great sight for us to turn aside and see. It is greater than what Moses saw, as the substance is greater than the shadow. In Jesus, God is made known to us and brought near. In His presence our souls can stay without a fear, unlike Moses, who "hid his face, for he was afraid to look at God" — for "GOD IS LOVE."
- Name — God names Himself by the fathers and the covenant of promise, not by the law. The distance is real, but gentler than Sinai's.
- Personal — "the God of your father" gave Moses his own link to that promise, not just an inherited story.
- Holy — He came down because He is gracious. Having come down, He shows Himself holy, and human nature hides.
- Living — God still names Himself their God. "I AM" is present tense, so Abraham, Isaac and Jacob live to Him and must rise.
- Near — The bush was the shadow. The substance is God made known in Jesus. There the soul that once hid its face can stay without fear.
And Jehovah said, I have seen assuredly the affliction of my people who are in Egypt, and their cry have I heard on account of their taskmasters; for I know their sorrows.
God speaks to Moses from the burning bush and tells him what He has noticed: a nation of slaves, their cry, and their pain. Two questions grow out of this one sentence: why did God wait so long, and what finally moved Him to act?
(The ESV reads "I know their sufferings." The quotes below use an older translation: "I know their sorrows.")
The decisive word in the verse is the small one: God calls these slaves His own. That claim, not their condition, decides the outcome.
These words reveal a great basic principle in the ways of God. It is on the ground of what He is that He always acts. "I AM" secures everything for "MY PEOPLE." He was never going to leave His people among the brick kilns of Egypt, under the whip of Pharaoh's taskmasters. They were His people, and He would act toward them in a way worthy of Himself. To be His people settled everything. They were the favoured objects of Jehovah's electing love, the subjects of His unconditional promise. He had come down to deliver them. The combined power of earth and hell could not hold them captive one hour beyond His appointed time.
That title starts here, and it becomes the demand God makes of Pharaoh.
The first time we read of God calling Israel "My people" was when He spoke to Moses from the burning bush (Exodus 3:7). Following this, the first demand to Pharaoh (Exodus 5:1) was "Let My people go."
The verse stacks three statements together. They answer years that looked like silence.
He declared three things. First, His attention to the cry of His people and His sympathetic concern for their sorrows. For a century or two it must have seemed as though He was indifferent. But it was not so. God is never in a hurry and He intervenes in His own time, which is the right time. The three statements in verse 7 are very touching: He had seen; He had heard; He knew their sorrows. So it always is with all His people, with us among the rest.
God says He heard their cry — but not that they cried to Him. Several writers press this distinction.
But He does not add that the cry was to Him. We may say then, as a prophet did later, that they groaned; but they did not groan to God. It was only a selfish sense of suffering. They groaned only because of their wretchedness; but there was no looking out to God — no counting on His mercy.
If the cry was not aimed at God, then the reason God moved has to lie somewhere else.
This lesson gives the soul great strength: God always finds His motive within Himself. It is on the ground of what He is, and not on the ground of what we are… There is not a word to show that the children of Israel had cried to the Lord. But their misery had touched His heart. He "knew their sorrows, and had come down to deliver them." So "God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us." (Romans 5:8)
Knowing here is not distant information. It is love that goes into detail.
He began to show more than His grace in giving His promises to the seed, which faith could lay hold of. He showed His own considerate love in caring for the need and sorrows of His people… He took notice of every circumstance of their trouble and sorrow.
Darby reads the "I" of these words as God stepping out of His own glory into a place strange to Him.
Is not this "I" the Lord placing Himself as coming down into Egypt? He came out of all that was natural to Himself and His glory. He placed Himself in the middle of what was strange to Him, to deliver them. "I have seen, I have seen the affliction of my people, and I have come down to deliver them." He speaks as identifying Himself with His people.
Writers read Israel's slavery as a picture of a condition shared by everyone, and their rescue as a picture of salvation.
Read Exodus 2:23 and 3:1-10. There we see the condition of the people in cruel bondage and slavery. It is an exact picture of our condition under the cruel bondage of sin and Satan. Their cries and groans came up to God… Such is the condition by nature of every man, whether he knows it or not. And note, the source of their deliverance was not in themselves. The source of our salvation is the love of God. God is love. He came down to deliver.
- Seen — God watched the affliction through long years that looked like indifference. He acts in His own time, and that is the right time.
- Heard — the cry reached Him, though it was not addressed to Him. Their misery alone moved Him, not their merit.
- Known — He noticed every circumstance of their trouble, not the general fact of it.
- Owned — "My people" is the word that settles the outcome; God acts on the ground of what He is, not what they are.
- Come down — He identifies Himself with them and steps into Egypt to deliver. The same love later sent Christ for sinners.
And I am come down to deliver them out of the hand of the Egyptians, and to bring them up out of that land unto a good and spacious land, unto a land flowing with milk and honey, unto the place of the Canaanites, and the Hittites, and the Amorites, and the Perizzites, and the Hivites, and the Jebusites.
God speaks to Moses from the burning bush. He tells him what He has already decided to do: come down, rescue a nation of slaves, and settle them in a land where six other peoples live. The verse is short. Yet commentators find in it the whole shape of redemption — where God starts, why He acts, and where He means to finish.
Nothing in the verse suggests Israel asked for this. One writer asks where God's motive comes from, and shows how little the people contributed:
God always finds His motive within Himself. He acts on the ground of what He is, not on the ground of what we are. The occasion of His action was the condition of His people. "The LORD said, 'I have surely seen the affliction of my people who are in Egypt and have heard their cry because of their taskmasters; I know their sufferings'" (v. 7). What infinite tenderness! There is not a word to show that the children of Israel had cried to the Lord. They had sighed and cried because of their bondage, but it does not appear that their hearts had turned to the Lord. But their misery had touched His heart. He "knew their sorrows, and had come down to deliver them." So "God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us" (Rom. 5:8).
God does not rescue Israel and then leave them to themselves. One writer notices that God calls these slaves His own before He does anything to improve them:
Who but God would have spoken so openly of a poor set of slaves as "My people"? Others would have delivered and dressed them up first. It is the same God who, as a father, falls on the neck of the returning prodigal son in his rags and kisses him. That comes before the honours poured on him later. But whether we look at the picture or at the reality behind it, one thing is vital to grasp. Redemption is the work of God, present in some sense, and delivering — not only from the enemy, but for Himself.
The verse contains two promises, not one, and they organise everything that follows:
The eighth verse points out the two parts of Exodus. The Lord announced two things He would do for His people. 1. I have come down to deliver them out of the hand of the Egyptians. 2. And to bring them up out of that land to a good land flowing with milk and honey. Exodus has two great parts which match these two statements.
God gave Moses both halves of that errand, and he managed only the first. Another writer sees the verse pointing past Moses to Christ:
God sent Moses to lead them out, and to bring them in (Exodus 3:8, 10, 12). He failed, but Christ does both. Meanwhile, as High Priest, Christ has gone in to keep us now joined to our true place of blessing, and in all the value of the blood, as God values it, until He puts us into actual possession at His coming again.
Between Egypt and Canaan lie forty years — and they are not mentioned here. Several writers make much of that silence:
If you look at Exodus 3, you will see that the wilderness formed no part of God's purpose... In Exodus 6 you find the same, and in Exodus 15, where faith celebrates redemption, you have the same thing. "You have guided them by your strength to your holy abode." This leaps right over the wilderness. He did bring them through the wilderness, but it was no part of His purpose for them.
The destination is described by what it produces without being forced. That contrast with Egypt is the point:
Not a word is said of the wilderness, and its forty years of endurance and toil. His plan was to test them there, which He did. But His purpose was to bring them to the place where He could dwell, to a land that "drinks water by the rain from heaven, a land that the LORD your God cares for" (Deut. 11).
after_note: DELETE He would bring us into a place where His own heart can be satisfied, and where He may dwell with and enjoy His people. How different from the land of slavery where nothing is to be had for nothing, where no man gives!
The promised land already has occupants, and God names them. One writer reads the names as a picture of what stands between a believer and enjoying what God has given:
The names here, as everywhere, are certainly significant. They stand for the powers of evil that hold the ground and would keep us from enjoying the inheritance God has given us in Christ. The Hittite, "child of terror" — how spiritual dread makes cowards of us all! The Amorite, "the talker," rather than the doer of the Word. The Canaanite, "the trafficker," companion to the talker, who turns the very truth of God into merchandise... while the Jebusite, "the treader down," never rests until it treads every divine thing underfoot. All these must be cast out.
- Down — God moves first; the people's misery, not their prayers, is what draws Him down.
- For Himself — He comes not only to break Egypt's grip but to take a people as His own, in their rags.
- Out — the first promise is rescue from Egypt, and it fills the first half of the book.
- In — the second promise is a land, and it is the goal; the desert was where He tested them, never His purpose for them.
- Kept — God sent Moses to bring them out and bring them in; he failed at the second, but Christ does both.
And now behold, the cry of the children of Israel is come unto me; and I have also seen the oppression with which the Egyptians oppress them.
God speaks to Moses from the burning bush and tells him what He has seen and heard in Egypt. Two things move Him: a cry that has come to Him, and an oppression He has watched. So why does He act now?
The verse says the cry came to God. It does not say the people sent it to Him. One writer notices what is missing:
The Lord then brings His care before Moses, saying, "I have surely seen the affliction of My people who are in Egypt, and have heard their cry because of their taskmasters. I know their sufferings." But He does not add that their cry was to Him. We may say, as a prophet did later, that they groaned. But they did not groan to God. It was only a selfish sense of suffering. They groaned because of their misery. There was no looking out to God — no counting on His mercy.
The verse adds sight to hearing. God has watched the taskmasters at work, and He notices the details:
He began to show more than His grace in giving the promises to the seed, which faith could lay hold of. He also showed His own thoughtful love in caring for the need and sorrows of His people... He took notice of every circumstance of their trouble and sorrow.
The verse says nothing about repentance or reform in Israel. Their condition alone moves God to act:
Here the absolute, free, unconditional grace of the God of Abraham, and of Abraham's seed, shines out in all its own brightness. Nothing holds it back — not the "ifs" and "buts," and not the vows, resolutions, and conditions of man's legal spirit... He had not come down to check whether the people His promise covered deserved His salvation. It was enough for Him that they needed it. Their oppressed state, their sorrows, their tears, their sighs, their heavy bondage had all passed in review before Him. For, blessed be His name, He counts His people's sighs and puts their tears into His bottle.
Another writer carries the same point into the New Testament. God loved people who were not looking for Him:
There is not a word to show that the children of Israel had cried to the Lord. They had sighed and cried because of their bondage, but it does not appear that their hearts had turned to the Lord. But their misery had touched His heart. He "knew their sorrows, and had come down to deliver them." So "God shows His love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us." (Rom. 5:8.)
The verse calls them the people of Israel — slaves making bricks for a foreign king. God owns them before He rescues them:
Who but God would have spoken so openly of a poor set of slaves as "My people"? Others would have delivered and dressed them up first. It is the same God who, as a father, falls on the neck of the returning prodigal son in his rags and kisses him. That comes before all the honours given to him later... redemption is the work of God, present in some form and delivering — not only from the enemy, but for Himself.
Once God calls them His own, both the outcome and its timing are settled:
"I AM" secures everything for "MY PEOPLE." He was never going to leave His people among the brick-kilns of Egypt, under the lash of Pharaoh's taskmasters... He had come down to deliver them. The combined power of earth and hell could not keep them captive one hour beyond His appointed time.
God hears the cry, and then He sends a man. He comes down Himself, yet works through someone unfit for the job:
In verse 8 God says, "I have come down to deliver them…" Then in Exodus 3:10 He says, "Come, I will send you to Pharaoh that you may bring My people… out of Egypt." God in His sovereign wisdom had chosen a man whose later actions showed him to be weak and unfit. Yet God would be with His servant. He would give him such power and authority that everyone would see the excellence of the power belonged to God, and not to the instrument He had chosen.
- Cry — The groan was one of misery, not of faith; God heard a cry that was never sent to Him.
- Seen — He had watched every circumstance of the trouble, so nothing about their sorrow was news to Him.
- Grace — He did not come down to check their merit. Their need was enough, and He kept count of their tears.
- Owned — He calls slaves in rags "My people," and delivers them not only from the enemy but for Himself.
- Sent — The cry becomes a commission. God sends a weak man, so the power on show is His own.
And now come, and I will send thee unto Pharaoh, that thou mayest bring forth my people the children of Israel out of Egypt.
God has just said that He Himself has come down to rescue Israel from Egypt. Then He sends a man to do it — one who had already tried to help his people, failed, and fled.
Verse 8 and verse 10 say two different things. God will deliver Israel — and Moses will bring them out.
Let us put these statements together. Combined like this, they give us a thought of enormous weight. In verse 8 God says, "I have come down to deliver them …" Then in Exodus 3:10 He says, "Come, I will send you to Pharaoh that you may bring my people …" In sovereign wisdom God had chosen one whose later actions marked him as weak and incompetent, yet God would be with His servant. He would give him power and authority in such a way, and in such measure, that everyone would see the greatness of the power belonged to God, not to the instrument He had chosen to deliver His people.
Moses had once rushed ahead of God's time. Now the time has come, and notice which word God uses.
"Come, I will send you" (Ex. 3:10). God's moment has arrived. Formerly Moses wanted to go without waiting for God's time, but now he is about to hesitate. God does not say "Go" but "Come." God sends him in His own company and fellowship. Even so, Moses is not willing to answer. He brings God four objections, one after another.
Forty years earlier Moses had acted on his own. What changed was not his desire but his commission.
Horeb is really the starting post for all whom God sends forth to act for Him. It was at Horeb that Moses learnt to take off his shoes and hide his face. Forty years before he had gone to work, but his movement was premature… Here was real authority. There is a vast difference between God sending a man, and a man running unsent… God had to teach him, and God had to commission him. Everyone who goes out to serve Christ and speak for Him needs the same teaching and the same commission from God.
Zeal and ability were never Moses' problem. The right to act was.
Authority means having the right or title to act, and not only the ability to do it; ability is what the word often translated "power" expresses. You could say Moses had zeal and ability when he first set out to right his people's wrongs in Egypt. But someone challenged his authority — "Who made you a prince and a judge over us?" — and he fled in disgrace. Later the LORD said to him, "Come, I will send you to Pharaoh that you may bring my people, the children of Israel, out of Egypt." This time he went as a messenger with God's own credentials.
The years of waiting were not wasted. God's timing had a reason.
God had used various circumstances to prepare Moses for this time when He tells him He is sending him to Egypt to deliver Israel from their bondage (v. 10). Perhaps by now he thought he was past the age of being usable by God at all, for he was 80 years old (Acts 7:30). But God knew that at 40 he was not ready, and 80 is just the right time, for God does not use one because of his strength, but more likely because of his weakness.
The man now sent to Pharaoh is the same man Israel had once pushed away.
Israel had rejected this Moses forty years before. Now they accepted him as their God-appointed leader. God sent him as "both ruler and redeemer by the hand of the angel who appeared to him in the bush" (Acts 7:35).
Israel's slavery is a picture of a deeper bondage, and God's rescue shows the pattern of ours.
Read Exodus 2:23 and 3:1-10, and you see the people in cruel bondage and slavery. It is an exact picture of our own condition under the cruel bondage of sin and Satan. Their cries and groans came up to God… And note, the source of their deliverance was not in themselves. The source of our salvation is the love of God. God is love. He came down to deliver. He sent Moses to deliver. "For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life."
- Sent by God. God comes down to deliver, and He sends a man to do it. One work, seen from both sides.
- Sent with God. God says "Come," not "Go." Moses goes in God's company, not just on God's errand.
- Sent, not running. Zeal without a commission collapsed forty years earlier; authority is what Horeb added.
- Sent in weakness. At forty Moses was not ready; at eighty he was, because God uses weakness rather than strength.
- Sent as a picture. The rejected man became the deliverer — a picture of a greater rescue that begins in the love of God.