What would Moses’ life have been like if God hadn’t called to him “in the flames of a burning bush in the desert near Mount Sinai,” Acts 7:30? Likely he would have continued his 40 year exile from Egypt as “an alien in a foreign land,” Exodus 2:22, where he’d settled down as a shepherd “tending the flock of Jethro his father-in-law” (3:1). And it wasn’t a bad life either; Moses had a wife and two kids, and a steady job that kept them all alive and close to family. 

But then God introduced himself to Moses in Exodus 3, starting Moses on a lifetime of knowing him. God began the “knowing” by stating who he was and why he was talking to Moses from a burning bush (5-10). Both points successfully got Moses’ attention, but he wasn’t comfortable with God wanting to send him back to Egypt to free his fellow Israelites (11). Which led to the first lesson in Moses’ journey to knowing God, that when God initiates a relationship with a human, he has a purpose in mind – and he supplies whatever is needed to accomplish it too. In Moses’ case, God would strike the Pharaoh hard enough that he’d let the Israelites go, and the Egyptians would then supply the Israelites with all that they needed too (19-22). 

Life for Moses then became an ongoing knowing of this God who made it obvious again and again that he deeply cared. But then a crisis arose that revealed just how well Moses had come to know God. 

The crisis was the making of the Golden Calf, and the Israelites claiming that it was the god who’d rescued them from Egypt (32:1-4). How quick they’d been to ditch God in favour of their own man-made god (7-8) – and resort to a wild party to celebrate it too (6). So God told Moses to “leave me alone to vent my anger against these people and destroy them” (9-10). Instead, Moses got back to God, and in a strongly worded appeal reminded God of his reason for ripping the Israelites out of Egypt, and what evil the Egyptians would accuse him of if he killed off the Israelites instead. He even said to God, “Turn from your fierce anger, relent and do not bring disaster on your people” (11-12).

Which only proved how well Moses knew God, because of course God wouldn’t destroy the Israelites, having promised “by his own self” to preserve and increase them (13). And God happily responded to Moses’ confidence in him by doing what Moses knew he’d do (14). It’s right after this incident too, that we then find out in Moses’ life “What knowing God does”….(next blog)

In Hebrews 11:26, Moses “regarded disgrace for the sake of Christ as far more valuable than all the wealth of Egypt, because he was looking ahead to his reward.”

So, whatever reward Moses was looking forward to, it totally outweighed everything that the most powerful and prosperous nation in the world had to offer. It also made disgrace and suffering “for the sake of Christ” totally worth the pain inflicted too. The best and worst of the world, therefore, couldn’t make a dent in Moses’ anticipated reward, so it must have been something very special to him, but what? 

Was it, for instance, God’s promise in Exodus 6:3-5 to free the Israelites from Egypt and “give them the land of Canaan”? Was that the reward Moses had in mind? But according to Deuteronomy 32:49-52, God told Moses that because of the one occasion when Moses didn’t trust him, “you (personally) will not enter the land I’m giving to the people of Israel.” No reward for Moses there, then.

Was he looking forward, instead, to God fulfilling his long term promise to Abraham that “through your offspring all nations on earth will be blessed” (Genesis 22:18)? Moses knew a greater world was coming; for all nations to experience it, therefore, would mean resurrecting those who’d died. So was being resurrected from the dead into this glorious new world the ultimate reward Moses was looking ahead to?

Or was there something else going on in Moses’ life that hinted at what he looked forward to most of all? There’s a clue in Exodus 3, when God told Moses he was sending him to Pharaoh to bring the Israelites out of Egypt (10), and Moses’ immediate reply in verse 11 was, “Who am I (to do such a thing)?” And that’s when God answered with five words in verse 12, that would carry Moses through the greatest adventure of his life, and make God so real to him that nothing could be greater – those five words being: “I will be with you.” 

And after years of knowing what God being with him was like, he could tell the Israelites on their way into Canaan that “The Lord God himself will cross over (into Canaan) ahead of you,” Deuteronomy 31:3, so, verse 6, “Don’t you ever be afraid or terrified, for the Lord your God goes with you; he will never leave you nor forsake you.” And that was the reward Moses valued more than anything else, that had come from “A lifetime of knowing God”….(next blog)

In Hebrews 11:26, Moses “regarded disgrace for the sake of Christ as far more valuable than all the wealth of Egypt.” Likewise Paul, who wrote in Philippians 3:7-8, “whatever things were gain to me, those things I have counted as loss for the sake of Christ. More than that, I count all things to be loss in view of the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I (too) have suffered the loss of all things, and count them but rubbish so that I may gain Christ.”

So here’s Moses on exactly the same wavelength as Paul, in that losing everything for the sake of Christ and knowing Christ had far greater value than the best this world had to offer – and worth the worst the world had to offer too. But for Moses to come to that understanding it would mean that he knew Christ too – but is that possible? 

Well, yes, according to Christ himself, who said in John 5:46, “Moses wrote about me,” and twice in Luke 24 Jesus referred to Moses as source material “concerning himself” (27), including his suffering, death and resurrection (44-46). And when Jesus was transfigured, and his face shone like the sun in Matthew 17:3, Moses appeared “talking with Jesus” – which suggests he’d talked with Jesus before.

As in Exodus 3, for instance, when God spoke to Moses (4-12), which couldn’t have been God the Father speaking, because no one has heard his voice (John 5:37), so who else but Jesus could be God speaking? In which case, Moses got to know him very quickly in Exodus 3 as the God who deeply cared about human suffering (7), whose mission it was to rescue those victimized by evil and bring them into a better world (8).

So when “the Lord then said to Moses” in Exodus 7:1, that “I have made you like God to Pharaoh,” it meant that all Moses’ words and actions from that point on would match the motive and mission of the Lord he’d come to know. What Moses said and did, therefore, was totally for the sake of Christ, and representing him as best possible, no matter the suffering. 

Not an easy job for Moses, though, because the Lord was also going to “harden Pharaoh’s heart so he won’t listen to you” (3). But Moses was now ready to take whatever disgrace and suffering came his way – not only to represent the Christ he knew, but going back to Hebrews 11:26, it was also “because he was looking ahead to his reward.” So on that point – “What was Moses’ reward?”….(next blog)

In Hebrews 11:26, “Moses regarded disgrace for the sake of Christ as much greater value than the treasures of Egypt, because he was looking ahead to his reward.”

So Moses knew that God richly rewards, but how did he know? He got his first clue when God spoke to him in Exodus 3:6, saying, “I am the God of your father, the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob” – the same God, in other words, who’d made that amazing promise to Abraham to “bless all peoples on earth.” And the reason God was saying this to Moses was to kick that promise into reality by sending Moses himself back to Egypt to go see “Pharaoh and bring the Israelites out of Egypt” (10). 

It was the greatest blessing Moses could have asked for, having tried to do something himself about the plight of his fellow Israelites forty years earlier, but he’d had to flee the country after murdering an Egyptian. And now God was offering him the chance to do what he’d dreamt of, the salvation of his fellow Israelites from the clutches of those who had no interest in God or his masterplan for humanity.

Moses, however, begged God to send someone else (4:13) – which made God very angry (14), and angry enough to want to kill Moses at one point too (24), because here was God offering Moses the chance to kickstart the salvation of the whole world for eternity from the deadly poison of evil, starting with Moses himself – but Moses himself wasn’t tuning in. Fortunately, when his brother Aaron told the Israelites what God had in mind, “they believed” that “the Lord was concerned about them and had seen their misery” (30-31).

They loved the idea of being saved from their misery by a God who clearly cared. And for their belief God richly rewarded them, not only saving them from their misery in Egypt, but also loading them up with whatever they asked the Egyptians for (12:36). They had no idea this was what would happen when Moses first appeared, but it got the point across that there’s a marvellous reward waiting down the line for those who believe God and get on board with what he’s up to. 

And that was the message to those in Hebrews as well, that for their belief and getting on board with God’s will they’d also be “richly rewarded” (Hebrews 10:35-36). And there was a real need for keeping that in mind, because like Moses, they too faced “Disgrace for the sake of Christ”….(next blog) 

The book of Hebrews was written to those who’d “stood their ground in the face of suffering,” Hebrews 10:32 – but like their Israelite ancestors, suffering had become hard to take, and they were losing heart, which brought on a reminder from the author of Hebrews to watch out “that none of you (like those ancient Israelites) has a sinful, unbelieving heart that turns away from the living God” (3:7-12). 

But if suffering carries that risk, what is the purpose of it? And why should suffering exist at all, now that Jesus is king of the world? Instead, evil remains and it’s wrecking the lives of so many of Jesus’ followers. Which got those in Hebrews thinking that maybe following Jesus was a mistake, and following Moses was better, because under Moses’ administration life was structured and predictable, with its standardized system of laws, sabbaths and sacrifices, and suffering only happened when straying from that pattern, but that wasn’t the case when following Jesus, because even the best behaving Christians could suffer too.

So how did the author of Hebrews answer that? Well, since it was Moses they were wishfully thinking of returning to, then why did Moses “choose to be mistreated along with the people of God” in Hebrews 11:25? Rather than hang on to his life of no suffering as a privileged prince in Egypt, Moses chose suffering instead, by deciding to side with his own people and risk the anger and deadly danger of some very powerful people in Egypt. He’d deeply hurt his Egyptian stepmother too, totally lose out on financial security, miss the fun, friendship and respect of his peers, and deny himself a very promising career, maybe even a legacy of note in the history of Egypt, as well as a splendid tomb to preserve his reputation and fame.  

So why on earth would Moses have made that choice? And it was by thoughtful choice too, because in verse 26, “He regarded” – meaning he weighed up the consequences, just like Jesus telling people to “count the cost” – and to Moses the cost of “disgrace for the sake of Christ was of greater value than the treasures (and pleasures, verse 25) of Egypt, because he was looking ahead to his reward.” 

To those in Hebrews 10:35, then, who were losing heart because of their suffering and needed a boost to their confidence, the author of Hebrews reminds them of why Moses made the choice he did: it’s because of “The God who richly rewards”….(next blog)

In Hebrews 11:27, it was “By faith that Moses left Egypt, not fearing the king’s anger; he persevered because he saw him who is invisible.”

So God must have revealed himself in such a way that Moses could carry on doing that God wanted him to do, no matter what the enraged leader of the most powerful nation in the world at that time threw at him. But how did God get that across to Moses?

There’s a clue in Exodus 3:1, when Moses had moved his father-in-law’s sheep to Mount Horeb, and there God spoke to him from a burning bush saying, “I am the God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob” (6), and “I’m sending you to Pharaoh to bring my people the Israelites out of Egypt” (10) and to “this (same) mountain” (12).

Moses wonders how the Israelites will react, to which God replies in verse 14, “Tell them: ‘I AM has sent me to you’” – ‘I AM’ is the same as “The Lord” (16) – and this was to be his “name throughout the generations” (15). Which to the Israelites would be a new way of seeing God, because as God himself said in Exodus 6:3, “by my name ‘the Lord’ I did not make myself known to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.”

Instead, he’d made himself known to them as El Shaddai, “God Almighty” (3), because in making a “covenant with them to give them the land of Canaan” (4), it got the point across that he had the power to make such a promise. But in making the promise come to pass, it would be by his name YHWH, “the Lord,” the ever-present one, to also get the point across that “I have watched over you and seen what’s been done to you in Egypt” (3:16), and “I will rescue you from your slavery, redeem you by mighty acts of judgment, take you as my own people and be your God, and give you the land I promised to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob” (6:6-8). 

Because “Then you’ll know that I am the Lord your God” (7); now they’d see him who is invisible in his obvious awareness of their troubles and his committed presence to help them. And when that God became visible to Moses “he left Egypt, not fearing the king’s anger,” Hebrews 11:27, because no matter what the future held, the “I am the Lord” (Exodus 6:8) – that name of God – was the God who’d promised him “I will be with you” (3:12). 

And that same God in the same way would be with those in Hebrews too, which is just what they needed to hear, because they’d been “Losing heart because of suffering”….(next blog)

It was “by faith,” Hebrews 11:24, that “Moses, when grown up, refused to be known as the son of Pharaoh’s daughter.”

But why on earth would Moses do that – taking into account Acts 7:22, that he “was schooled and trained in all the wisdom of Egypt, maturing him into a superb speaker and a renowned man of action.” At age 40 (verse 23), Moses was at his peak. He was smart, respected, and headed for a rosy future as a privileged member of the Egyptian royal family – potentially becoming one of the great leaders of the most powerful, richest and wisest empire at the time. 

But God had other things in mind, which he’d predicted back in Genesis 15:13 when he’d told Abram, “Know for certain that your descendants will be strangers in a country not their own, and they’ll be enslaved and mistreated 400 years,” but, verse 16, “in the 4th generation your descendants will come back here (to Canaan).” This prophecy, then, had been humming along behind the scenes since the time of Abram, predicting the actual time when the Israelites would be freed from slavery and returned to Canaan. But Moses, it seems, was blissfully unaware of it.  

Not for long though, because at age 40 Moses “decided to visit his fellow Israelites” (Acts 7:23), which set in motion a staggering decision on his part – to turn his back on his Egyptian family, renounce his royal office, and throw in his lot with his fellow Israelites. And why did he do that? There’s a clue in Psalm 103:7, that “The Lord made known his ways to Moses” – and especially his “justice for the oppressed” (6). But here was Moses on the side of the Egyptian oppressors who were viciously exploiting his fellow Israelites to boost their own wealth and “the pleasures of sin” – and that hit Moses hard (Hebrews 11:25-26).

It was seeing the difference between God’s ways and the Egyptian ways that ripped Moses out of his blissful ignorance. And isn’t that how God helps us today? “The Lord makes known his ways” to us as well, in the obvious difference between his ways and the world that we too have blissfully gone along with. And it hits us just like it hit Moses. But that too is one of the great blessings in God’s plan of salvation, that he gives us the eyes to see. The time came for us – just as it did for Moses, and for those in Hebrews 10:32 – when we “first saw the light” as well.

And for Moses it came because – as Hebrews 11:27 phrases it – “He saw him who is invisible”….(next blog)

In Hebrews 11:23 it was “By faith that Moses’ parents hid him for three months after he was born, because they saw he was no ordinary child, and they were not afraid of the Pharaoh’s edict” – the edict being that when an Israelite boy child was born he should immediately be thrown into the Nile (Exodus 1:22). 

But Amram and Jochebed, Moses’ father and mother (Exodus 6:20), decided that disobedience was totally called for against this monstrous mandate – based on two points: first of all, that they and their children were descendants of Abraham through whom God was continuing to play out his promise to bless all nations, so the genocide of the Israelites was totally against God’s will.

And secondly, at the birth of their second son and younger brother of Aaron, Amram and Jochebed believed that God wanted this boy alive. They could see “he was no ordinary child” (Hebrews 11:23). Jochebed called him “a fine child” in Exodus 2:2, and in Acts 7:20 Stephen described him as “beautiful before God.” In some way, then, they knew that in this little boy, God had a special purpose.

And notably it was his parents’ faith in both these points that removed all fear in what they were doing. Hebrews 11:23 states, “they were not afraid of the Pharaoh’s edict.” That’s amazing, because they were defying the greatest superpower in existence at the time, but it didn’t scare them one bit. If only Adam and Eve had done that when confronted by the devil into disobeying God. But even Abraham was scared of the powers that be (Genesis 20). So was Isaac (Genesis 26). Jacob was scared stiff about meeting with his brother Esau (Genesis 32-33). And Joseph was never called upon to resist under threat of death.

So the first mention in Hebrews of descendants of Abraham being so fearless were these two unnamed people in Hebrews 11. But their purpose, like all the named people of faith in Hebrews 11 was exactly the same, to illustrate some aspect of God’s salvation, the knowledge and experience of which he blesses us with on our faith in him.

And for Amram and Jochebed that blessing was being utterly fearless, just as it was for those in Hebrews 10:32 who “stood their ground when things got really tough” for them too. And why were they so fearless? Because they were “Given the eyes to see” ….(next blog)

To Joseph, who “By faith – when he was on his deathbed – spoke about the exodus of the Israelites from Egypt and gave instructions about his bones,” Hebrews 11:22. 

But how on earth could Joseph speak about an exodus from Egypt when the Israelites had no reason to leave? They’d flourished in the land and been held in high regard by the Egyptian hierarchy. And what’s more, how could Joseph have known there’d be an exodus in the first place, when it wouldn’t happen for at least 140 years after his death? 

There’s a clue in Genesis 50:24, when Joseph told his brothers, “I’m about to die, but God will surely take care of you and bring you up from this land to the land which he promised on oath to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.” Central to Joseph’s life and confidence was God’s promise to give Abraham and his family line “The whole land of Canaan as an everlasting possession” (17:8).

A land, however, that Joseph realized he would not see himself, because God had wanted him in Egypt instead, in a position of such enormous influence and respect that God could build Israel into a nation because of him. So Joseph was stuck in this distant land, but his faith in God’s promise to get Israel back to Canaan never wavered. And nor had his longing for the land he’d never see too – his faith and longing being so strong that he made sure his bones would be taken back to Canaan (Genesis 50:25), because in his heart that was home.

God had given him a major part in the creation of that home too. Like his father Jacob, Joseph had been the next link in the chain of God’s promise to Abraham to bless all nations. And Joseph only had to look back on his life, as his father had, to see how God had made him into such an effective link, directing his life through all kinds of trials that at the time seemed to have no purpose at all.

But we can see the purpose in Joseph’s life, that like him – no matter where we live, or what world we’re stuck in that shows no indication of God’s promise being fulfilled in our lifetime – God will get our “bones” to our promised home too. He made sure Joseph’s bones got home through Moses (Exodus 13:19), and now through Jesus he’s doing the same for us (John 14:3). No wonder, then, that “Faith makes us fearless” ….(next blog)

In Hebrews 11:21 “Jacob, as death approached, blessed each of Joseph’s sons, humbly bowing his head to God while leaning on his staff (in his old age).” 

It was no doubt “humbly” that Jacob did the blessing, because who was he to pass on any sort of blessing after the kind of life he’d led? But, like Isaac his father, it concerned Jacob as he neared death that a blessing on the next in line in the family be given, since in their own lifetimes the fulfillment of God’s promise to Abram in Genesis 12:3 hadn’t happened. The next generation, therefore, needed to know the promise was still active and certain.

But what made Jacob so certain? There’s a clue in his blessing on his own son Joseph in Genesis 48:15-16 – “May the God before whom my fathers Abraham and Isaac walked, the God who has been my Shepherd all my life to this day….may he bless these boys (Joseph’s sons) and increase them greatly upon the earth.” 

Jacob spoke as an old man looking back over his life from that special moment in Genesis 28:12 when God had told him in a dream that “All peoples on earth will be blessed through you and your offspring” (14), along with God’s personal promise to Jacob to “watch over you wherever you go,” and “never will I leave you until I’ve done what I promised you” (15). What an amazing promise – but how undeserving Jacob had been for such a promise, having just conspired with his mother to steal Isaac’s blessing meant for Esau (27:5-17). How deceitful and unaware of God the young Jacob had been.

But in Jacob God was also revealing his plan of salvation, in the assurance we can have of that salvation – no matter the mess of our lives we may have made – because in Jacob’s life we see – as he saw – that God has the heart of a shepherd. Lost, clueless, undeserving, messed up sheep like Jacob are the perfect example of that, and Jacob being a shepherd himself was the perfect one to understand it. So was the future king David, who’d also been a shepherd, and recognizing from that experience – and his life experience since then – that “The Lord is my Shepherd,” whose heart, like that of Jesus, is totally intent on assuring his sheep that we’re safe in his hands (John 10:27-29). 

So what part in God’s salvation process did Jacob’s son Joseph then play? It was the hope and assurance that “God gets our bones home”….(next blog)