Exodus 3:12–17

We might expect that the moment God gave Moses His commission, his reply would be, "Here am I." But no. God had yet to bring him there... This is very unlike the man who forty years before "supposed that his brothers would understand that God was rescuing them by his hand." Such is man — at one time too hasty, at another time too slow. Moses had learnt a great deal since the day he struck down the Egyptian. He had grown in the knowledge of himself, and this produced hesitation and timidity. But then he clearly lacked confidence in God. If I am merely looking at myself, I shall do "nothing"; but if I am looking at Christ, "I can do all things."

It is quite right that we should have a sense of our own utter nothingness... But it is also right that we should think much of God. For when He sends, it is not a question of what we are, but of what He is — and it is no small thing to be invested with His authority and power... The presence of the Lord was to be both the warrant for his mission and the source of his strength.

Moses objects that he himself is unfit. But this only brings the assurance that God is with him. Self-distrust need not be discouragement. In fact, the more complete it is, the more he will know God's all-sufficiency.

God then gives a sign, a token that He will be with him. But the sign would only come true after Moses obeyed. It was to strengthen him and gladden him once he had already obeyed.

Of course His promise to be with him guaranteed everything. But Moses was slow to believe it, so God stooped to give him a token. When God made the promise to Abraham, He took account of how frail our faith is. He confirmed His purpose with an oath, as Hebrews 6:17 reminds us. With Moses He did not confirm His word by an oath, but by a token — and that token came true later in this book.

When He sent Moses to deliver Israel from Egypt, God said to him, "you shall serve God on this mountain" (Ex. 3:12). All through the struggle with Pharaoh the word was, "Let My people go, that they may serve Me." And when the people reached Sinai, the word was, "you shall serve the LORD your God" (Ex. 23:25). The law was given so that the people might know God's will for them, and serve Him by obeying it.

For his encouragement God firmly assures him that the people he brings out will serve God on that mountain. This is the fruit of salvation, and the sign of who has worked in it: it brings the former slaves of sin back to Him in obedience.

The burning bush is now the symbol of God's constant care of Israel, even in the furnace of Egypt... And it is in connection with this mysterious bush that Horeb is first called "the Mount of God." For now the Lord first tells of Himself there... And this same spot which now testified of grace should later testify of glory to them, as the Lord says here to Moses.

So in verse 13 we find him raising a great question as one more objection to what was proposed. The children of Israel had been in a land of idolatry for several centuries. So they knew the names of the false Egyptian gods well. Moses was to approach them in the name of the God of their fathers. But their minds were confused by everything around them. They would be sure to ask, What is His name?

God had already revealed Himself to Moses as the God of his fathers, and this might have been enough. But nothing can ever satisfy doubts and fears. What a glimpse this gives of Israel's condition — that they might not know the name of the God of Abraham, of Isaac, and of Jacob!

But Moses puts another question; for the human heart is full of questions… It is amazing to see how the human heart reasons and questions, when what it owes God is obedience without hesitating. More amazing still is the grace that puts up with all the reasoning and answers all the questions. Each question seems only to draw out some new feature of divine grace.

There is great force in these words. It was not only what God was going to do. Man would probably have preferred "I shall do." But God takes His stand on these weighty words, "I AM THAT I AM" — the self-existing, ever-being One. In truth, everything hangs on Him. All others are only beings that exist. God is the only one who can say "I AM." Whatever exists was called into being, and it may pass out of existence, if God so chooses.

The words "I AM" translate one Hebrew word, "Ehyeh." It comes from the same root as Jehovah. It clearly stresses the eternal nature and existence of the One who can speak this way. It is an unmistakable claim to deity.

God unfolds all these gracious titles to meet the needs of His people. And when He calls Himself "I AM," that one title takes them all in. In taking this title, Jehovah was handing His people a blank cheque, to be filled in for any amount. He calls Himself "I AM," and faith has only to write beside that unspeakably precious name whatever we want. God is the only figure that counts, and human need may add the zeros. If we want life, Christ says, "I AM the life."

"I AM" is His own essential name. But when it comes to how He governs the earth and relates to it, His name is the God of Abraham, of Isaac, and of Jacob. That is the name every generation is to remember Him by. It gave Israel a very special place, now that God had visited them and taken them up under His name.

This name means that God is the self-existent, eternally existent One. With Him there is no question of past and future, as there is with us… The same name belongs just as much to the Lord Jesus. He uses it many times in the Gospel of John, and settles the matter with this declaration: "Truly, truly, I say to you, before Abraham was, I am" (John 8:58). What a wonderful name to fill a believer's heart with adoration!

You know how they became slaves in Egypt. When Exodus, the second book of the Old Testament, opens, we see Abraham's descendants there. They were a great and mighty nation, but they were helpless slaves under the cruel rule of Pharaoh, Egypt's great king. But not only were they slaves, they had also forgotten the God who had chosen them and made them His own. They were idol-worshippers in Egypt (see Joshua 24:14). God's people had so far forgotten their God that they had even forgotten His great Name.

God had made Himself known to Abraham as Jehovah (Genesis 15:7). But here He explains that name. Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob knew the name Jehovah, but they did not know what it truly meant. He reveals Himself as the Self-Existing One, THE I AM THAT I AM. He is the One who is, who was, and who is to come (Rev. 1:4). And this wonderful Name — the Unchanging, Living One, the Eternal, the Name too deep to search out — is the Name of our Lord who has redeemed us.

He made Himself known as the great "I AM" — the One self-existent, ever-existent, unchanging, and therefore always true to what He is in Himself. Israel would prove to be an unstable and stubborn people. If they had been dealing with anyone other than "I AM," judgment would soon have swept them away. God was patient with them, and He will still achieve all His purpose for them, because He is always true to Himself. We should remind ourselves of this. We now know God far more closely, since Christ has revealed Him. But we do not lose the value of these earlier revelations. The One whom we know as Father is still the "I AM" to us, as much as He was to Moses and the children of Israel.

These words reveal a great and basic principle in God's ways. He always acts on the ground of what He is. "I AM" secures everything for "MY PEOPLE." He was never going to leave His people making bricks in Egypt, under the whips of Pharaoh's slave-drivers. They were His people, and He would act toward them in a way worthy of Himself.

As we trace the different names God takes in Scripture, we find each one tied to the need of the people He was dealing with. "Jehovah-jireh" (the Lord will provide). "Jehovah-nissi" (the Lord my banner). "Jehovah-shalom" (the Lord sends peace). "Jehovah-tsidkenu" (the Lord our righteousness). All these gracious titles of His are unfolded to meet the needs of His people; and when He calls Himself "I AM," it includes them all. By taking this title, Jehovah handed His people a blank cheque for them to fill in for any amount... If we want life, Christ says, "I AM the life." If we want righteousness, He is "THE LORD OUR RIGHTEOUSNESS." If we want peace, "He is our peace."

We do not wonder that He claims to be the self-existent One, as in His words to the Jews: "Before Abraham was I AM" (John 8:58). This is the name that belongs to God alone, the name He used when He revealed Himself to Moses and to Israel: "I AM has sent me to you" (Ex. 3:14). He has always been the Word, the One who makes God known, so that older voice was His own. He is the Abiding, the Unchangeable, the Eternal.

"I AM" is His own essential name. But when it comes to how He rules the earth and deals with it, He takes another name. All generations are to remember Him as the God of Abraham, of Isaac, and of Jacob.

This name expresses the essential being of God — His name as the self-existent One. So it affirms His eternal being... But this is not all. After revealing what He is in His own essential existence, He adds... This is pure grace on the part of God. "I AM" is His own essential name. But when it comes to His rule over the earth and His relationship with it, His name is the God of Abraham, of Isaac, and of Jacob — the name all generations are to remember Him by. This gave Israel a very special place under His name. It points to their being chosen by the sovereign grace of God, and to their being loved for their fathers' sake. It also reveals that Israel will always be the centre of God's ways and the key to His purposes on the earth.

How infinitely gracious of God! The name He takes forever in connection with Israel is not the one that reduces every other creature to its own nothingness. It is not the one that makes everything merely the result of His word and His will. He loves and cherishes the name in which He has bound up the objects of His choice with Himself.

So God made Himself "the God of Abraham, of Isaac, and of Jacob" — heirs of the promises, and pilgrims upon earth.

This statement contains a very important truth — one many professing Christians seem to forget. God's relationship with Israel is an eternal one. He is just as much Israel's God now as when He visited them in the land of Egypt... He does not say, "This is my name for a time, as long as they continue what they ought to be." No. He says, "this is my name forever, and this is my memorial to all generations." Let my reader think about this. "God has not rejected his people whom he foreknew." (Rom. 11:2) They are His people still, whether obedient or disobedient, gathered together or scattered abroad.

In Exodus 3:14-15, His name is the memorial for His people forever. He remembers His covenant with the fathers (2:24), and His name is pledged on behalf of His people. And in the utter failure of the people soon after (Ex. 32), where they practically give up God, Moses pleads the name, the revealed character of the Lord.

Israel's deliverance was meant to show what the name Jehovah means, and so make it His memorial name for all generations. And in it Israel would find their lasting ground of confidence.

Suppose Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob had ceased to exist. Could God still have taken their names — the name of nothing — to describe Himself to Israel? He might have said, I am He who was with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, when they existed. Even then it would have been a completely unworthy relationship... He is not the God of the dead, but of the living. But this truth went further. As far as soul and body go, Abraham was dead. Though living for God, he was not what God meant him to be... He was to be complete, and so raised from the dead.

God takes care to say another word: "Jehovah the God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, has sent me to you… This is my name forever, and this is my memorial to all generations." How infinitely gracious of God! The name He takes forever in connection with Israel is not the one that reduces every other creature to its own nothingness. It is not the name that makes everything merely the result of His word and His will. He loves and cherishes the name in which He has bound up the objects of His choice with Himself.

God had sent Moses out from "the bush" to be their deliverer. He sent him under one title: "the God of Abraham, of Isaac, and of Jacob," the "I am" who had looked on His people and cared for them. A living God in covenant with men meant life, not death; and if death were there, then a life supreme above it. So resurrection had to fill out such a declaration. The hand God held out to man was not going to clasp the limp fingers of a corpse.

On his deathbed Joseph "took an oath of the sons of Israel, saying, 'God will surely visit you, and you shall carry up my bones from here'" (Gen. 50:25)… To the natural eye there was little likelihood, when Joseph was dying, of his people leaving Egypt. But this dying saint rested on the sure word and promise of God… Nearly four hundred years passed away. Then God did visit His people, the oath still held, and Joseph's bones went with them when they left Egypt.

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 thoughtful love, caring for the need and sorrows of His people… He took notice of every circumstance of their trouble and sorrow.

Salvation by such a One must be a complete salvation. It is not complete until the land of promise is their own… The land is good and large, flowing with milk and honey. It is not a land of narrowness, as Egypt is… There is all "fatness," which is the literal meaning of the word for milk. There is all sweetness, as the honey implies. Salvation for us must end in satisfaction, or it is not salvation.

In Ex. 4:29, Moses and Aaron gathered the elders of the people. In verses 30 and 31 these same men are called "the people." So "the children of Israel" are seen here in the persons of their representatives, and get credit for what they do. Yet in fact they may have, and must have, been a small number compared with the whole nation. They were the heads of the people, and represented the people then and always.

Moses had said, "They will not believe me or listen to my voice." But the people did believe, just as the Lord had said. They heard how He had visited them and looked on their affliction. Touched by His grace, they bowed their heads and worshipped.

But those evangelists preach a very defective gospel who would only bring the sinner to the cross and leave him there. This is not deliverance. All this — the scarlet line, the true token, the gathering them to the house of Rahab — all this was only preparation for two things. The purpose of God was to bring them out, and to bring them in.

The Lord tells Moses what He intends, and speaks tenderly of having seen His people's affliction, heard their cry, and known their sorrow. So the purpose of grace included not only deliverance from slavery, but bringing them into the blessings of Canaan. For Israel to be content with the one and fall short of the other would dishonour that blessed purpose of God's grace, if not be presumptuous self-will.

He now announces His purpose to Moses... 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... He would bring us into a place where His own heart can be satisfied, and where He may dwell with and enjoy His people.

What was the purpose of God? To bring them out, and bring them in. The wilderness was no part of God's purpose, but it was part of the ways of God. They had to learn themselves.

Six nations are named here to be overthrown — the full power of evil — and the land is good and large, flowing with milk and honey. It is not a cramped land, as Egypt is... There is all "fatness," which is what the word for milk means, and all sweetness, as the honey implies. Salvation for us must lead to satisfaction, or it is not salvation. Our Canaan is to be entered now by faith.

The blessings of that land were earthly, but they came from the hand of God. They were not won by irrigation and hard work, as they were in Egypt.

Ham's descendants were settled in the land when the children of Israel entered it. But God had set it apart for Israel, and the Canaanites had to be driven out of the land of promise.

They suggest those powers of evil which preoccupy and would prevent our enjoyment of our God-given inheritance in Christ. The Hittite, "child of terror" — how spiritual dread makes cowards of us all!... The Amorite, "the talker," not the doer of the Word. The Canaanite, "the trafficker"... while the Jebusite, "the treader down," never rests until all divine things are trampled under foot. All of them must be cast out.

These instructions are important for all time; for they place beyond doubt the exact foreknowledge of God. He knew whom He had to deal with, what resistance He would meet, and how it would be overcome. He saw all things from beginning to end. No difficulty or trial can come to us which our God has not foreseen, and for which His grace has not already made provision.

Some must enter there, even though the people who first heard the good news of Canaan did not enter in because of unbelief. Those who did enter would be blessed in that exceedingly good land. There they would eat bread without shortage, and lack nothing in it.