God Hardened Pharaoh’s heart, but the Israelites had been told that He will free them from the Egyptian oppression. We see God’s faithfulness to Moses and the Israelites as He prepares to liberate them from the Egyptians. There are times when we feel abandoned by our friends, by our family and even God. God never changes and is He always faithful, we are the ones that change orlose faith. God said to Joshua “As I was with Moses, so I will be with you; I will never leave you nor forsake you.” This promise is repeated in the book of Hebrews.

Moses and Aaron returned to Egypt with God’s message for Pharaoh and they said to him, “Let my people go…”; he refused. Now things go from bad to worse. The straw that was used to make bricks was previously provided by the king but now he said they are to gather their own straw, but still make their quota of bricks. Some of the Israelites appealed to Pharaoh who called them lazy and told them to go back to work. At this, Moses and Aaron were angry saying “You have put a sword in the Egyptians hands to kill us”.

We continue the encounter at the burning bush, between Moses and God. In spite of all of the assurances that God had given Moses, 5 times he said “No”. It is clear that at this point in his life, all of the confidence and desire for action he had when he murdered the Egyptian, is gone. He has become as meek as the sheep he is tending for his father-in-law. God insists that Moses must go to rescue the Israelites in Egypt, and so he sent Aaron, Moses’ brother as Moses’ mouthpiece, so to speak. Moses had undisputed skills as a leader and for this reason, God insisted.

As we saw earlier, Moses was a foreigner in a foreign land. What happened next changed his life forever. Imagine his surprise to see a bush on fire, but the bush itself was not destroyed. A voice from the bush told him to take his shoes off as he was on holy ground. It was God speaking and He told Moses that He was sending him to rescue His people in Egypt. Moses had a number of “but Lord..” objections. How many times have we said to the Lord “but lord..” when He has asked us to do something for Him?

When Moses was older, he saw an Egyptian beating up on one of his fellow Hebrews. Moses killed him and buried him hoping no one would see. Well, he soon found that didn’t work out too well for him. Pharaoh tried to have Moses killed but he ran away to Midian. Later Moses married Zipporah, a priest’s daughter. They had a son whom Moses named Gershom, as he was a stranger in this land of the Midianites. This reflected the dark time in Moses’ life. Meanwhile, the Egyptians continued persecuting the Israelite slaves and their cry for help was heard by God.

When the king of Egypt saw that the Israelites were multiplying much faster than the Egyptians, he told the Israelite midwives to kill all of the male babies but spare the girls. The midwives feared God more than they feared Pharaoh, so they ignored the command. When the Israelite population continued to rise, he ordered all Egyptians to throw all male babies into the Nile. A mother was afraid her newborn son would be killed so she wrapped him up and put him in a basket among the reeds of the Nile. Pharaoh’s daughter found him crying there and decided to keep him. She named Him Moses because she drew him out of the water. If you look at this passage in Exodus, you’ll find God had His hand in this all of the time.