Sermon 8/24/08
Out of Egypt: Moses - Exodus 1:8-2:10
(view lectionary notes for this text)
I don’t often preach on Old Testament texts. When it comes to the scripture lessons for the day, I always have a hard time choosing Old Testament over New. The teachings of Jesus I just find so compelling that I can’t pass them by. But before fall arrives, and we take a different focus, we’ll pause for just a couple weeks, switch gears, and look at the story of Moses from the book of Exodus.
Our passage opens with a statement that says a lot: “Now a new king arose over Egypt, who did not know Joseph.” One little sentence tells us something important – this new king doesn’t know Joseph, or how important Joseph was to saving Egypt. He’s forgotten his history. A common fear when we look at the history of a people or culture or globe is that history will repeat itself – particularly that the mistakes of history will be repeated. We fear, and rightly so, when we look through the pages of history, we fear that given enough time, enough distance, we will forget even the most significant events – forget what brought us to those situations, why we shouldn’t have let those things happen, how we could prevent them happening again. I’ve heard people comparing the war in Iraq to Vietnam, or comparing the genocide in Darfur to the genocide just a decade ago in Rwanda, or people cautioning lest something as horrific as the Holocaust be repeated ever again in any form. The Bible, too, is full of stories where the people forget God and what God has done for them. Here, the new Pharaoh has forgotten about Joseph and the blessings the Israelites have been to his country.
And so a tricky situation unfolds. I can’t help but read this story of the Egyptians and the Israelites without thinking about the United States today. I’ve heard similar conversations about immigrants living here as the king has about Israelites living as immigrants in Egypt in this text. The king notices that the Israelites are increasing in number, and he’s worried about losing power and control of his country. He suspects that the Israelites would betray the Egyptians in a time of need, although he seems to have no basis for his fears. So he forces the Israelites into labor – essentially, they are forced to become slaves, working under terrible conditions, with ruthless Egyptian supervisors.
Still, God seems to be working in ways the pharaoh cannot predict. The Israelites are having babies and increasing in number. So the Pharaoh order the midwives to kill any male children. The brave midwives refuse, making up a story for the Pharaoh about the speed of delivery for Israelite women, because, we read, the midwives fear God. They no doubt put their own lives at risk for their refusal. So the Pharaoh goes one step further – he orders male children simply thrown into the Nile. And then something strange happens. A Levite man and woman have a son. They’re from the tribe of priests of Israel, but we’re not even told their names. The mother does put the baby into the Nile – but tucked into a basket. It’s interesting to note that the word used here for “basket” means literally “little ark.” Like God used Noah and an ark to save God’s people, we know this baby in the little ark is being used in some special way by God.
Of all people, who finds this little child? Pharaoh’s daughter. She clearly realizes the child is an Israelite – why else would he be floating in a basket in the river? But she is filled with pity, even knowing it is her own father who has created the conditions that resulted in this child being abandoned. And in yet another twist, she hires the child’s own mother to nurse the baby, so mother and child are brought back together in the end. The Pharaoh’s daughter names the child “Moses,” meaning “I drew him out of the water.”
All of this is a prelude of sorts, a prequel to the story of Moses that unfolds throughout Exodus. Moses as an adult is the focus of the next forty-something chapters, but the author of Exodus wants us to know something about Moses’ beginning, about God finding a way to save the people, about God finding a way to use an unlikely candidate, before we hear the rest of Moses’ story. In fact, the beginning of Moses’ story is somewhat like the birth stories for Jesus. What’s important to us is what Jesus did as an adult – his preaching, teaching, and ministry. But there’s something important, of course, in knowing about Jesus’ beginnings, about the men and women who let themselves be used by God for Jesus’ birth to happen. This isn’t the story of Moses. But it’s the story of how, in the most difficult of times, during the worst days of oppression, God was still with the people, and God’s people were working with God to make a way for something new to happen.
What’s different between these Old Testament stories and the New Testament teachings of Jesus, for me at least, is that sometimes I find it harder to see what we can take from the Old Testament texts and make our own. It’s fascinating to see how things work out in this story – but where’s the lesson, the learning, for us? But I think there are some things we can take away, when we start to stretch our minds and imaginations to see ourselves even in this story from so very long ago. First, as I mentioned, this story is about what happens when we forget to remember. Somehow, over time, the Egyptians and their king forgot all about Joseph and what the Israelites did for them. Because they forgot their own story, their own history, both the Israelites and the Egyptians went through a great deal of suffering. Remembering their story could have prevented such pain and loss. Throughout the scriptures, God calls the people to remember the covenant, remember the promises made between God and the people. God always remembers God’s promises, but we’re not so good at our part. That’s why, in the church, ritual is such an important part of what we do. When we celebrate communion, or celebrate a baptism, we use the same words, over and over, sometimes exactly the same words – because they help us not to forget. Today as we baptized Caden in this community of faith, we repeated the apostle’s creed, and we made the same promises together for Caden that we’ve made for other children. Caden’s parents made the same promises for him that they made for his big brother Kyle. We go through the same ritual so we remember God’s unconditional love for us, and our responsibility and commitment to be disciples because of that love. We’re called to remember our story.
We also see acts of great courage and bravery here, and from unusual places. Five people break the law of a tyrannical king in this story. We’d call it civil disobedience at best, outright criminal behavior at worst. The five – five women, in fact – stand up, in secret subtle ways, and in ways that happen right under the Pharaoh’s nose, in his own home in fact. Shiphrah and Puah, the midwives, some of just a few women who are actually named for us in the Old Testament, make sure the male children are not put to death. Moses’ mother takes a chance and sends Moses down the river in a basket, rather than to his death. She must give up her own child, but she does so and gives him life. The Pharaoh’s daughter makes Moses her own child, knowing for sure that he is a Hebrew baby, bring the child right into the Pharaoh’s own house. And the Pharaoh’s sister, perhaps unknowingly, brings mother and child back together by arranging for Moses to be nursed by his biological mother. All of these women put themselves at risk. The midwives and Moses’ mother would have been no better than slaves in Egypt – they would have no rights or protection if they were caught in their ‘crimes’. And how would the Pharaoh react to see his own sister and daughter so directly disobeying his laws – their actions ultimately lead to the Pharaoh’s death. But whether by a sense of what God would have them do, or by what God does through them, they stand up against what is wrong, and Moses lives.
We also learn something about how God can call us and use us. I hope you’ve heard me say many times by now that God calls each one of us for a purpose. The pastor is not the only person who is called by God for service and ministry – we’re all called. This passage is a powerful reminder about the different ways God might need us to act. The majority of Exodus is about Moses and his leadership in freeing the Israelites. These women – Shiphrah and Puah and the others – they never appear again in the scriptures. This is their one and only appearance. But what if they had considered themselves too unimportant to be of use? What if they didn’t think their role counted if the whole story wasn’t going to be about them? What if they hadn’t risked or acted with conviction or done what they did, counted themselves out? Without them, Moses literally could not have lived. They were paving the way for Moses.
Today, I want you to ask yourself – how is God calling you? Maybe you don’t think you’re the next Moses. But God is still at work in you, using you. Whose way are you called to pave? In what story do you make an appearance that might make all the difference, even a life and death difference for someone else? Today we celebrate Caden’s baptism. What role will you play in his story? How will you pave his way, as his life unfolds?
We’ve yet to hear Moses’ story – we’ll hear more about him next week, and how God calls him. But today, we have a prelude, a prequel, that’s as important as the story itself. Remember how God acts in this story and your story. Be brave enough to take the risk when God needs you to act. And be ready for God to use you – in small ways, hidden ways, and life-changing ways. Amen.